Kabul: A NATO gunship helicopter killed two civilians in Khost, the northern province of Afghanistan, on Thursday.
The attack targeted a Haqqani network leader in Tere Zayi district, NATO officials said.
“At the time of the strike, two civilians were walking near the moving targeted vehicle,” NATO said Thursday. “They were previously unseen by coalition forces prior to the initiation of the airstrike.
Unfortunately both were killed as an unintended result of the strike.”
NATO said a “precision airstrike” killed the Haqqani leader and two other insurgents while they were driving in a vehicle. The announcement also described how NATO troops nearly missed civilians near the site of the attack.”
Civilian deaths due to coalition military operations in Afghanistan are a major source of tensions between Afghans and NATO.
US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates personally apologized to Afghan President Hamid Karzai after NATO troops in a helicopter gunship misidentified nine children gathering firewood for insurgents and killed them.
The killing sparked massive protests throughout the country and calls for the international force to cease airstrikes and night raids. At least 2,777 civilians have been killed in Afghanistan in 2010, a 15 percent increase over the prior year, according to a recent United Nations report.
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