Fresh graves, fresh ruin in village Taliban claims was hit by U.S. strike

By KATHY GANNON
Associated Press Writer

KARAM, Afghanistan – Waving shovels and sticks, enraged villagers surged toward foreign journalists brought here Sunday by Afghanistan's ruling Taliban militia to see what officials say was the devastation of a U.S. air attack.

"They are coming to kill us! They are coming for information, to tell the planes where to bomb!" angry and terrified villagers shouted as they charged the reporters. Taliban escorts held them back.

Sunday's trip to the village of Karam in Afghanistan's eastern mountains marked the first time since the U.S.-led air campaign began Oct. 7 that the Taliban have allowed international journalists into areas controlled by the Islamic militia.

The Taliban, who escorted journalists to the village, claim nearly 200 people were killed here Thursday. If true, it would be the deadliest single strike by U.S. and British warplanes.

"They are innocent people living here," one villager, Gul Mohammed, said. "There is no military base. What is it they are looking for in Afghanistan? Where is Osama bin Laden? He is not here. Why did they bomb us?"

The small village had clearly been hit by explosions. A number of houses were damaged or reduced to rubble, and several bomb craters were dug into the rocky landscape. Dozens of sheep and goat carcasses were strewn about, the air thick with a rancid stench.

But it was difficult to assess claims of casualty figures three days after the attack. Muslims traditionally bury their dead quickly. Villagers pointed out what they called traces of the attack's deadliness, including a bloodstained pillowcase by a house and what appeared to be a rotting human limb.

Washington has expressed regret for any civilian victims in its airstrikes, saying it doesn't target noncombattants. It has acknowledged a stray bomb hit homes outside Kabul last week but has said it can't verify the alleged Karam attack.

In the hospital in Jalalabad, 25 miles to the east, doctors treated what they said were 23 victims of bombing at Karam – one, a child barely two months old, swathed in bloody bandages.

Another child, Samina, played with two apples on her hospital bed. Neighbors brought the 5-year-old to the hospital after Thursday's bombing raid killed her entire family. When she was better, Dr. Hashok Ullah said, hospital workers would send the girl to an orphanage.

Unsmiling and silent, Samina stared out at strangers Sunday from under a cap of head bandages.

"She just doesn't speak," Ullah said. "She hasn't spoken since she came in."

A father, Ahmanzai, lay in one bed hugging his wailing 11/2-year-old son, Azizullah – both of them, bandaged against burns and wounds from what villagers said was a second bombing run in the area of Karam on Saturday.

Female victims lay behind the locked door of the women's ward. Inside, doctors folded back one woman's enveloping black shawl to show her wound – a head injury, sustained in the same attack they said killed her two children Thursday.

At least 18 fresh graves were scattered about the village, marked with jagged pieces of gray slate. Two were tiny – freshly dug for what residents said were children. Villagers said more bodies were buried up in the mountains, taken there by residents as they fled the now mostly deserted community.

An old man knelt by one grave in the village, sobbing. He looked up, furiously, at journalists and their cameras and lobbed stones to drive the outsiders away.

One villager, Toray, stood by the ruins of his former home, its roof gone. He clutched a scrap of metal bearing the words "fin-guided missile" in English.

Toray, who uses only one name, said he lost his five children and his wife when the warplanes came. "I was asleep down there in the morning, when they bombed," he said, gesturing toward the base of the mountain.

Scratching his dust-caked beard, he looked toward his house and asked, "What do I have left? Nothing."

The United States launched its air campaign on Oct. 7 to root out bin Laden, the top suspect in the Sept. 11 terror attacks thought to have killed 5,600 people.

The Taliban insist there are no military bases near Karam. However, it is believed that bin Laden operated terrorist training camps here in Nangarhar province.

It was unclear whether any of the camps are in the Karam area or whether they were the intended targets of the attack.

APNP-10-14-01 1511CDT