No Evidence is "Convincing Evidence" for U.N. in Aghanistan

[thedrifter]

No Evidence is "Convincing Evidence" for U.N. in Aghanistan [Steve Schippert]

The U.N. has investigated and and says it has "convincing evidence" that U.S.-led coalition strikes recently did in fact kill 90 civilians. Yet, the U.N. says its "convincing evidence" is the word of locals and Afghan officials critical of the strike.

UN says strikes hit children

The United Nations said Tuesday that it had found "convincing evidence" that U.S. coalition troops and Afghan forces killed some 90 civilians, including 60 children, in airstrikes in western Afghanistan.

The UN said it based its findings solely on the testimony of villagers and meetings with Afghan officials, and did not provide photos or evidence that its investigators saw any graves.

U.S.-led coalition troops, supporting Afghan commandos during the raid, said they believe that 25 militants, including a Taliban commander, and five civilians were killed during the raid Friday in the village of Azizabad, in Herat Province. The coalition commander in the country has ordered an investigation.

No graves. No photos. Just villagers' claims, and within the clear context of a complete dismissal of the U.S. forces' position.

Isn't that how the Haditha Marines found themselves "investigated"?

Wish I could find more intelligent and thoughtful words. But I am too angry and busy grinding my teeth to dust, and my private vernacular at the moment is not family-friendly.

I am sick to death of the willingness to accept at face value the testimony of supporters of the enemy or those intimidated by the enemy's very real, violent, and lethal domination of their towns while the account of American soldiers is disregarded, distrusted and presumed false. It's disgraceful.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

'Opium floodwaters' receding in Afghanistan, UN says
By Carlotta Gall


KABUL: The Afghan opium harvest has dropped from last year's record high, the United Nations announced Tuesday, arguing that the tide of opium that has engulfed Afghanistan in ever-rising harvests since 2001 was finally showing signs of ebbing.

"The opium floodwaters in Afghanistan have started to recede," Antonio Maria Costa, executive director of the UN Office of Drugs and Crime, wrote in a foreword to the 2008 opium poppy survey, which was published Tuesday. "Afghan society has started to make progress in its fight against opium."

Poppy cultivation has dropped by 19 percent since 2007 and is now beneath 2006 levels as well, the report said. The harvest was also down, although by a lesser margin because of greater yields, falling by 6 percent, to 7,700 tons.

More than half of Afghanistan's provinces have been declared poppy free - that is, 18 of 34 provinces grow no, or very few, poppies, up from 13 poppy-free provinces last year.

The results, gathered by the United Nations through satellite imagery and checks on the ground, are a success for the government's strategy of weaning farmers off the illicit crop through persuasion, incentives and local leadership. A drought in northern Afghanistan also helped bring numbers down, although that has also increased the hardship farmers are suffering.

Nevertheless, the Afghan poppy crop remains the world's largest, and now 98 percent of the crop is grown in the lawless southern and southwestern regions that are in the grip of a virulent insurgency. Two-thirds of all opium in Afghanistan in 2008 was grown in the province of Helmand, where the Taliban control whole districts. Coordinating with government soldiers, 8,000 British troops have failed to make much headway, either in curbing Taliban activities or the drug industry.

"If Helmand were a country, it would once again be the world's biggest producer of illicit drugs," Costa wrote.

Attacks on drug eradication teams have in the past come from angry farmers, the report said, but in 2008 they appear to have been carried out by insurgents. Attacks included a suicide bombing that killed a UN data collection worker and a police eradication team in eastern Afghanistan, and rocket attacks on eradication teams in Helmand.

UN says strikes hit children

The United Nations said Tuesday that it had found "convincing evidence" that U.S. coalition troops and Afghan forces killed some 90 civilians, including 60 children, in airstrikes in western Afghanistan.

The UN said it based its findings solely on the testimony of villagers and meetings with Afghan officials, and did not provide photos or evidence that its investigators saw any graves.

U.S.-led coalition troops, supporting Afghan commandos during the raid, said they believe that 25 militants, including a Taliban commander, and five civilians were killed during the raid Friday in the village of Azizabad, in Herat Province. The coalition commander in the country has ordered an investigation.

Ellie