Civilian killings continue

Though not as dramatic as the Farah bombings which killed over a hundred civilians early this month, there have been more killings of civilians by foreign troops:

Farmer's killing sparks protest in Farah
Ahmad Qureshi - May 18, 2009 - 10:50

HERAT CITY (PAN): Nearly a hundred people on Monday staged a protest demonstration against the US forces for what they say killing an innocent farmer in the southwestern Farah province.

The US-led coalition soldiers killed a local farmer and bombed his motorbike while the man was irrigating his farmland in Poshtrod district on Monday morning, a member of the provincial council Balqis Roshan told Pajhwok Afghan News.

She claimed the troops destroyed the farmer's motorbike soon after killing him.

"The US troops used hand grenades to destroy motorcycle of the farmer in order to prove it for locals that the farmer wanted to plant bombs or tried to attack their convoy," she alleged.

She added more than 80 tribal elders and locals had gathered to carry the dead body towards the Governor's House to show the governor that the killed person was a local... (link)

Note that the killing reported above was in Farah - the same province where over 100 civilians were killed early this month.

And another:

Coalition strike kills Afghan farmer: officials

KABUL, May 24 (AFP) – An Afghan farmer has died after being wounded in a US-led coalition air strike, launched last week after he was wrongly suspected of planting a roadside bomb, Afghan and NATO officials said Sunday...

The May 20 strike in the eastern province of Paktya was called in to support ISAF troops, it said.

"A subsequent investigation has determined that the individual was not emplacing improvised explosive devices, as originally suspected," it said... (link)

And US-paid contractors are in on the game as well:

US military investigates contractors after Afghan killing

KABUL, May 23 (AFP) – The US military in Kabul said Saturday it was looking into referring the killing of an Afghan civilian by US contractors to the justice department in Washington.

Contractors from the Paravant group, affiliated to the Blackwater security firm accused of killing civilians in Iraq, were involved in a traffic accident in Kabul on May 5.

The contractors told the US military that after they stopped because of the accident, they had felt "threatened" by another vehicle, Lieutenant Colonel Chris Kubik told AFP.

"They fired on the vehicle and they ended up killing one Afghan and wounding two others, one of whom was a pedestrian," Kubik said.

Kubik added Paravant was subcontracted to the US military in Afghanistan to do weapons training with Afghan soldiers as part of US-led efforts to build the war-shattered country's army... (link)

Finally:

Airstrike kills construction worker, wounds 18 others near Afghan capital

KABUL, May 23 (Xinhua) - An airstrike of international troops on Friday night killed a road construction worker and wounded 18 others in Afghanistan's Wardak province, some 70 km west of the capital Kabul, an official said on Saturday.

"The war plane of international troops attacked a garden near a road construction company in Chak district, killing one and injuring 18 other workers," Hajji Hazrat Janan, head of the provincial council, told Xinhua.

He also said five of the wounded were in critical condition and had been transferred to a hospital in Kabul... (link)