Hospital bombing

A month has passed since U.S. airstrikes destroyed a Doctors Without Borders hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan. The medical aid group immediately called for an independent international investigation, but the U.S., which admitted fault in the incident, has yet to agree to the inquiry. Increased pressure by the group has yet to yield significant gains, so it released its own preliminary investigation review yesterday. The findings refute claims that the hospital was over-run by the Taliban.

KABUL, Afghanistan — A crowded hospital in the embattled city of Kunduz that treats war wounded came under attack on Saturday and the American military acknowledged that it may have killed 19 patients, staff members and others at the facility while firing on insurgents nearby. The attack, which the military said in a statement might have been “collateral damage” that occurred while engaging militants, drew a fierce international outcry. The head of the United Nations, Ban Ki-moon, condemned it and called for a “thorough and impartial investigation.” It also renewed scrutiny of the United States military’s record of causing civilian casualties, which has alienated the Afghan public and often undermined relations with the government here.

Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) nurse Lajos Zoltan Jecs was in Kunduz trauma hospital when the facility was struck by a series of aerial bombing raids in the early hours of Saturday morning. He describes his experience: