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KABUL: At least913 civilians have been killed while another 2,800 received injuries in the first five months of the ongoing year, the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC) said Monday.
“Our findings show that civilian casualties still take place without reduction in intensity, something that has made us concerned. Inflicting any type of casualties on the civilians is a violation of human rights, Islamic laws and the war laws, and unfortunately the warring parties do not pay any heed to it,” MousaMahmoudi, the chief executive of the commission said.
Prior to that, the US Department of Defense had put the number of those dead at 950 and that of the injured at 2,213 during the same period. It blamed the Taliban for killing 778 civilians (80 per cent) and injuring 1,971 more.
The NATO-led Resolute Support mission said that the US troops were responsible for killing of 60 individuals and injuringof 66 others while the Afghan security forces had reportedly killed 68 and injured 90.
Also, reports say that unknown armed groups are responsible for claiming the lives of 44 civilians and injuring 97.
Taliban denied the report with the militants’ spokesman, ZabihullahMujahid, saying that their fighters take care of civilian lives in their attacks.
Dozens of civilians, including school children, were killed and wounded in the last week’s attacks in Kabul and Ghazni province –for which the Taliban have claimed responsibility.
Civilians were killed and wounded in a joint Afghan and foreign forces’ operations launched in the provinces of Wardak and Baghlan.
The Ministry of Defense (MoD) blames the Taliban for being the main reason behind the civilian casualties.
“Taliban and other terrorist groups are the foremost causes behind the civilian casualties across the country. You witness their bombings and suicide attacks in the big cities and inside the residential areas, and their use of civilians as human shields on the battle grounds,” said FawadAman, a spokesman for MoD.
