Afghanistan | Doctors Without Borders hospital said to be misidentified before being bombed

In this Friday, Oct. 16 file photo, an employee of Doctors Without Borders walks inside the charred remains of their hospital after it was hit by a U.S. airstrike in Kunduz

The crew of a U.S. warplane that attacked a Doctors Without Borders hospital in northern Afghanistan last month, killing and wounding dozens of civilians, misidentified the target, believing it to be a government compound taken over by the Taliban, according to an investigation report obtained yesterday.
The report said the crew of the U.S. AC-130 gunship relied on a physical description of the compound provided by Afghan forces, which led the crew to attack the wrong target. It said the intended target, thought to be under Taliban control and being used in part as a prison, was 450 meters away from the hospital.
Investigators found no evidence that the crew or the U.S. Special Forces commander on the ground who authorized the strike knew the targeted compound was a hospital at the time of the attack.
The plane fired 211 shells at the compound over a 25-minute period before commanders realized the mistake and ordered a halt, it says.
The report says the attack on Oct. 3 in the city of Kunduz killed at least 31 civilians and injured 28 others. Investigators determined that additional civilians likely were killed or injured.
The investigation was led by U.S. Army Brig. Gen. Richard Kim and was comprised of representatives of NATO and the Afghan government. It was charged with determining facts surrounding the incident but not to assign blame.
A subsequent U.S. military investigation was done to look further at the case and to determine accountability. Gen. John Campbell, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, was scheduled to make a public statement yesterday about the further investigation. Officials said they intended to release a summary of that probe but not the full report, which is about 3,000 pages.
Doctors Without Borders, known by its French initials MSF, said earlier this month in its own report that several doctors and nurses were killed immediately, and patients who could not move burned to death in the ensuing fire. Hospital staff members made 18 attempts to call or text U.S. and Afghan authorities, the group said.
People fleeing the main building were cut down by gunfire that appeared to track their movements, while a patient trying to escape in a wheelchair was killed by shrapnel, the MSF report said.
A copy of the new report was obtained by The Associated Press yesterday. It has not been publicly released.
The report said investigators found no evidence that the Americans involved knew they were attacking a hospital. It said they found no evidence that key commanders, including the Afghans and the AC-130 gunship crew, had access to a “no strike” list of targets that were off-limits to attack. Under U.S. rules of engagement, no hospital or similar facility is a valid target.
It is unclear whether the U.S. Special Forces commander on the ground, who authorized the air assault, had the map grid coordinates for the Doctors Without Borders hospital available to him at the time he authorized the attack, the report said. The medical charity had provided GPS coordinates for its medical facilities in Kunduz to U.S. military authorities in Kabul and to Afghan government officials on Sept. 29.
President Barack Obama has apologized for the attack, one of the worst incidents of civilian casualties in the 14-year history of the U.S war effort. Robert Burns and Lynne O’Donnell, Washington, AP

Some in US military suspended for Afghan hospital attack

The U.S. commander in Afghanistan says some of those most closely involved in the mistaken air attack on a hospital in Kunduz have been suspended from their duties. Gen. John Campbell isn’t giving names or saying how many people have been temporarily removed from their jobs. He said at a news conference yesterday in the Afghanistan capital that those individuals will be subject to investigation under the military justice or administrative discipline systems. Brig. Gen. Wilson Shoffner says some military personnel involved in the airstrike violated U.S. rules of engagement, but he’s not being more specific.