- (AFP) - The United States has promised money to the Afghan
government to compensate victims of an accidental June 30 bombing raid
on a wedding party that left up to 48 dead.
A spokesman for Afghan President Hamid Karzai said two US officials had
visited Karzai and offered support worth two million dollars, Time magazine
reported Wednesday.
"It's not compensation as such. It's support of the nation,"
Karzai's spokesman Fazel Akbar told Time, after US commander of operations
in Afghanistan General Dan McNeill and US Ambassador Robert Finn visited
the Afghan president after the raid on a wedding in remote Uruzgan province.
"There was the promise of cash aid but still we did not receive it,"
Akbar added.
Afghan cabinet minister Arif Noorzai, who headed a joint Afghan-US investigation
into the killings, said: "Verbally, at least, the Americans have admitted
the attack was a mistake."
Noorzai told Time the money would be distributed by Karzai "to the
families affected by the bombing who have already suffered too much."
Up to 117 people were also wounded, according to Afghan authorities.
The United States claims the bombing was prompted by hostile anti-aircraft
guns in the area, and that coalition aircraft attacked six targets near
the village where pre-wedding celebrations were being held only after they
were fired on.
But while the Pentagon accepts that the military operation resulted in
civilian casualties, it has been unwilling to go along with Afghan figures
over the number of casualties.
A preliminary inquiry last week made limited headway as US investigators
were not shown any graves. A more detailed inquiry is due to begin around
July 13.
The rugged area, the birthplace of fugitive Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad
Omar is, in the view of the US military, still a stronghold of pro-Taliban
sentiment.
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