ICRC Slams US Afghan Raids

The assault "left 230 families, almost 2,000 people, in four villages homeless," it said in a statement cited by Agence France-Presse (AFP).

The Geneva-based group said that dozens of Afghan civilians were killed in the US raids.

Investigations into a US-led offensive on the western province of Herat late April found that no less than 50 of the declared 136 fatalities were Afghan civilians.

A UN probe had found that 49 civilians, including women and children, lost their lives in the operation in the Zerkoh Valley, about 120 kilometers south of Herat city.

A delegation from the ICRC and the Afghan Red Crescent Society also found that "173 houses had been destroyed or were so badly damaged as to be uninhabitable."

There has been a steady rise in the killing of Afghan civilians, including children, who are also shot dead at checkpoints manned by foreign forces.

Last week, 21 Afghan civilians were killed in NATO air strikes in south central Helmand province.

Indiscriminate

ICRC head in Afghanistan, Reto Stocker, slammed the indiscriminate killings of civilians in the war-torn country.

All sides involved in the conflict were "legally obliged to distinguish at all times between legitimate military objectives and the civilian population and civilian objects," he said.

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