NATO Image Problem: Civilian Deaths (AP)

Source: Associated Press

NATO Image Problem: Civilian Deaths

Sunday June 17, 2007 7:01 AM

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By JASON STRAZIUSO

Associated Press Writer

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) - NATO has an image problem in
Afghanistan - and a U.S. soldier who fired a Humvee's machine
gun into a crowd of civilians after a deadly suicide bombing
Saturday shows why.

Despite the Taliban quickly claiming responsibility for the car
bomb attack on a U.S. convoy that left four Afghan civilians
dead, people on the street became enraged only after American
bullets landed in the crowd, killing one and wounding two.

Some 50 to 100 people began chanting “Death to America,” and
others jabbed their fingers at Afghan police.

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The shooting came the same day that four senior officials in
NATO's International Security Assistance Force summoned
journalists to discuss civilian casualties, which is hurting support
- both in Afghanistan and in NATO's European capitals - for the
international Afghan mission.

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Fairly or not, Mustafa Alani, director of security and terrorism
studies at the Dubai-based Gulf Research Center, said Afghan
deaths at the hands of foreign soldiers are seen differently than
Taliban attacks, which some see as an internal Afghan conflict.

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Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,,-6715596,00.html