Word: uruzgan
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 2000-2009
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...post-Taliban Afghanistan, where rival clans have begun to try to use the U.S. military for their own ends. The U.S. military admitted this week that it had killed and captured the wrong people when it struck what it believed to be a Taliban stronghold in the town of Uruzgan three weeks ago. U.S. commanders were forced to apologize and offer financial compensation...
...also prove to have been the U.S.'s most calamitous blunder. According to authorities in Uruzgan and the surrounding area, the Americans killed the wrong guys. The soldiers slaughtered at Sharzam, they say, were not enemy fighters but anti-Taliban troops loyal to U.S.-backed interim Afghan leader Hamid Karzai. They belonged to a military commission appointed by the new provincial government to oversee the collection of leftover Taliban weapons. "A terrible mistake has been made," said Abdul Ghani, an Uruzgan businessman...
According to eyewitnesses, U.S. commandos moved on Uruzgan shortly before 2 a.m. on Jan. 24, accompanied by eight helicopters and at least two armored humvees. Local Afghans said that when the Americans burst into the school, they found Afghan fighters sleeping and began spraying the beds with gunfire. A guard named Hamdullah, who evaded the attack by hiding in a ditch, told TIME he heard men inside the school plead, "For the love of Allah, do not kill us. We surrender." According to villagers, the Americans shot most of their victims at close range. After two hours, the commandos choppered...
...Uruzgan is certainly a place that could confound an army. The province was a Taliban hotbed that sent hundreds of young men to fight for the regime. Mohammed Younis, the warlord in charge of the military compound raided by the U.S., was friendly with senior Taliban leaders; his son had close ties to Taliban Health Minister Mohammed Abbas Akhund, one of the movement's founders. A Kandahar official told TIME that Akhund and a few other Taliban leaders are believed to be hiding in the mountains outside Uruzgan. While it is possible that U.S. troops simply went to the wrong...
...heard no gunfire from inside the school. Two dead Afghans were found with their wrists bound. One U.S. soldier left behind a note: "Have a nice day. From Damage Inc." Days after the attack, the classrooms at the school were still soaked in thick blood. Surveying the carnage, a Uruzgan elder said, "The U.S. must be punished for what they did in this room." Even mistakes aren't easily forgotten...