US Troops Attacked Afghan Hospital Before Provincial Banning
Troops Stormed Clinic, Destroyed Medical Equipment
Troops Stormed Clinic, Destroyed Medical Equipment
by Jason Ditz
February 26, 2013
US officials continue to feign shock at the decision to ban special forces from the Wardak Province of Afghanistan, but as details of their behavior in the province continue to emerge, the only wonder is that they managed to operate for so long without such a banning.
The latest information comes from the Swedish Committee for Afghanistan (SCA), which has reported that US troops once againattacked one of their hospitalsearlier this month, in the Wardak Province, damaging the site andbreaking equipment before eventually leaving.
This was the second time that clinic had been attacked by the US in recent months, and the exact same facility was the site of a two and a half day siege in October in which US troops inexplicably occupied the facilityand took every patient and civilian within prisoner, before eventually releasing them all and leaving.
The US has an extremely poor history with respect to the Geneva Convention protections of remote hospitals, and had attacked a different SCA hospital in 2009, smashing the site up and ordering the doctors not to treat anybody else until they had reported their names to the NATO occupation forces.
NATO confirmed the most recent attack on the hospital, insisting it was carried out "in conjunction with Afghan forces" and that they had "compensated" the owners of the building for any damage caused.
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