Aid group withdraws from Afghan city after hospital hit

KABUL — Doctors Without Borders withdrew from the Afghan city of Kunduz, a day after the hospital where the aid group had been treating war wounded came under attack from what the US military said may have been its aircraft.

At least 22 people, including 12 Afghan aid workers, were killed and dozens of patients and hospital staff were injured in the assault, which destroyed much of the hospital.

The hospital isn’t “functional” now and patients were transferred to other medical facilities, Mr Tim Shenk, spokesman for the group, which goes by its French name Medecins Sans Frontieres, said in an email yesterday (Oct 4). MSF will continue its work at four other locations in Afghanistan as health needs in the country are “extremely high”, he said, adding that some staff remained behind in Kunduz to help out in the city’s two remaining hospitals.

The NATO-led security mission in Afghanistan said yesterday that it had conducted a preliminary multi-national assessment of the attack and hoped to have the results in a “matter of days”. The US military is also investigating.

On Saturday the military acknowledged that it carried out an air strike near the hospital and that “there may have been collateral damage”. The air strike was directed at insurgents who were firing on US soldiers assisting Afghan forces, the Pentagon said in an e-mailed statement.

The area has been the scene of intense fighting in recent days, US Defence Secretary Ash Carter said, adding that both US and Taliban forces were operating nearby. The US military has supported the Afghan army by ground and air in Kunduz since the Taliban battled its way into the northern city a week ago.

President Barack Obama offered condolences to the victims of the “tragic incident” in a statement on Saturday. The Defence Department has started an investigation, and will “await the results of that inquiry before making a definitive judgment as to the circumstances of this tragedy”, the statement said.

MSF yesterday demanded an independent international body conduct a “full and transparent” investigation of the bombing “under the clear presumption that a war crime has been committed”.

The group said all parties in the conflict were aware of the hospital’s location because it had provided the GPS coordinates in advance. It said the attack lasted more than 30 minutes after it alerted military officials in Kabul and Washington by phone that it was under fire.

It disputed that there was fighting nearby at the time, and reiterated the claim in an e-mailed statement today.

“There can be no justification for this abhorrent attack on our hospital that resulted in the deaths of MSF staff as they worked, and patients as they lay in their beds,” the group said in the statement. BLOOMBERG