Bombing Afghanistan: A Partial List of Civilian Deaths in 2007.
Compiled by Voices UK, October 2007

Deaths caused bv the bombing of Afghanistan rarely receive much attention in the British media. The following is a partial list of reported, civilian deaths due to US/NATO airstrikes in 2007:

November 2007: Several civilians – including at least 2 children - are killed in a NATO airstrike in northwestern Afghanistan, according to local residents [Source: Reuters, 6 November 2007]

October 2007: At least 13 civilians are killed in NATO airstrike bear Kabul, according to the head of Wardak provincial council, Haji Hazrat Janan. According to Janan 11 people from one family, including women and children, were killed [Source: BBC, 23 October 2007].

20 September 2007: Six Afghan civilians, most of them women and children, are killed in a NATO air strike during a battle with Taliban fighters in southern Afghanistan, according to a district governor [Source: Agence France Presse, 20 September 2007]

26 August 2007: 18 civilians are killed and over 22 wounded in a NATO airstrike in southern Afghanistan, according to local residents. [Source: Hindustan Times, 26 August 2007]

7 July 2007: Afghan elders claim 108 civilians have been killed by bombing in western Afghanistan during the previous week. Villagers in the northeast say a further 25 civilians were also killed in airstrikes. [Source: Associated Press, 8 July 2007]

30 June 2007: An airstrike on Helmand kills more than 30 civilians. [Source: Reuters, 30 June 2007]

22 June 2007: Twenty-five civilians, including nine women and three young children, are killed by NATO airstrikes called in by British forces in the Gereskh district of Helmand [Source: The Times, 23 June 2007].

18 June 2007: An airstrike on a religious school in south-eastern Afghanistan kills seven children [Source: Guardian, 19 June 2007]. On 27 Jun MSNBC.com reports that, ‘According to several officials, and contrary to previous statements, the U.S. military knew there were children at the compound’ but considered its primary target to be ‘of such high value it was worth the risk of potential collateral damage.’

27 May 2007: At least 47 civilians – including at least two girls, Najeba (9) and Fatima (10) - are killed following a US airstrike on a wedding party in Haji Nabu. Predictably, a spokesperson for the US-led forces ‘denied that any innocent people had died.’ [Source: Sunday Times, 24 June 2007].

21 May 2007: At least 16 civilians are killed in the US bombing of Azizi village in Kandahar (Source: Associated Press, 7 Jun).

8 May 2007: Over 50 civilians are killed in airstrikes on the village of Sarwan Qala in Helmand, according to local residents. ). “Three houses were completely destroyed,” a shop keeper who lives near the village, told the New York Times. “One of the houses belonged to Faizullah. The family of seven is dead, the whole family. Still now they are digging the bodies from the rubble.” [Source: New York Times, 11 May 2007].

April 2007: Fifty-seven civilians – almost half of them women and children – are killed when US forces bomb a village in Herat, destroying 100 homes. “The bombardments were going on day and night,” Mohammad Zarif Achakzai, whose eighteen-year-old son was killed in the bombing, told the BBC. “Those who tried to get out somewhere safe were being bombed. They didn’t care if it was women, children or old men.” [Source: BBC, 31 May 2007]

See Six Years On: 13 Things You Should Know About the War in Afghanistan