Killings of innocent Afghans fuelling terror: Karzai

KABUL airstrike in Parwan province, former president Hamid Karzai on Thursday said killings of innocent Afghans by American forces fueled terrorism and anarchy.

Five schoolchildren were killed in a NATO airstrike in the Siagard district of the central province on Wednesday afternoon, local officials said on Thursday. However, the coalition in a statement said those killed were enemy combatants.

In a statement from his office, Karzai said incidents like the Parwan strengthened terrorism and extremism in the country.

“This is continuation of the war in which innocent people are being killed. The roots of terrorism do not lie in homes and villages of Afghans but across our borders,” said the ex-president.

Karzai strongly condemned shameful methods CIA interrogators used to extract confessions and information from detained terror suspects. He said he backed President Ashraf Ghani’s stance on the revelations.

A day earlier, President Ghani described the US Senate Committee on Intelligence report detailing CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques as “shocking.” He said the CIA torture “violated all accepted norms of human rights in the world.” He said there could be no justification for such kind of actions.

Karzai said he had been against detention and harassment of Afghans by the Americans and his opposition remained the key point in his poisonous relationship with the Americans.

The former president also congratulated Pakistani education activist Malala Yousafzai and Indian child rights campaigner Kailash Satyarthi on receiving the Nobel Peace Prize awards.

ma/mud

Visits: 3