Ten people, including seven children, reportedly died in the US airstrike in Kabul after officials targeted a vehicle harboring explosives.
On Sunday, Pentagon launched an airstrike on a vehicle thought to belong to ISIS-K near the international airport in Kabul, Afghanistan. According to the authorities, the car was loaded with explosives that could be used to carry out another terrorist attack.
After sending in a drone to deal with the looming threat, US officials confirmed that the target was hit, whereas military spokesperson US Navy Captain Bill Urban insisted that there were no indications of civilian casualties during the preliminary investigation.
“We are confident we successfully hit the target. Significant secondary explosions from the vehicle indicated the presence of a substantial amount of explosive material,” he said.
As it has now been confirmed, however, as many as ten people, including seven children, died after the drone strike triggered the explosives in the car and resulted in a compounded blast.
According to the reports, 36-year-old Zemaray Ahmadi, who was staying in a nearby house with his extended family, was killed along with his sons Farzad, 12, Faisal, 16, and Zamir, 20.
Among the deceased civilians were also six of Ahmadi’s nephews and nieces aged from 2 to 28 years old.
“Why have they killed our family? Our children? They are so burned out we cannot identify their bodies, their faces,” a distressed relative, Ramin Yousufi, said in an interview with BBC while breaking into tears and calling the airstrike a “brutal attack which happened based on wrong information.”
Speaking out to BBC was also Emal Ahmadi who revealed that his 2-year-old baby girl was among the victims of the blast.
Meanwhile, heartbroken father Ramal Ahmadi slammed the US airstrike that cost three of his children their lives.
“I was inside the house with my wife when it happened. My brother had returned home from work so some of the children jumped into the car — it’s just a silly thing we do, they like to drive the car inside,” he told the Times.
“My brother had got out of the driver’s seat and my 10-year-old nephew Farzad was driving. If the US are killing Daesh [Isis] then we’re happy but you can see there’s no Daesh here, they killed innocent people.”
Following the reports of civilian casualties, Pentagon admitted they were in no position to deny these claims before backing down on the airstrike and insisting that “no military on the face of the earth works harder to avoid civilian casualties than the United States military, and nobody wants to see innocent life taken.”
“We’re in a particularly dangerous time right now. The threat stream is still real, it’s still active, and in many cases it’s still specific,” Pentagon press secretary John Kirby said.
“We take it very, very seriously and when we know that we have caused innocent life to be lost in the conduct of our operations, we’re transparent about it.”
Defending the drone strike, Kirby went on to say that they believed it was necessary to carry out the airstrike to counter “what we believed to be a very real, a very specific and a very imminent threat.”
What are your thoughts on this matter? Let us know in the comments and don’t forget to SHARE this post with your family and friends. For more news and stories, follow us on Facebook!
Recommended Video For You!
Three Dot Tattoos Are Popping Up All Over. Cops Now Warn If You See One, Get Far Away Fast