La MOD hace frente a desembolsos civiles afganos de la muerte

El ministerio de la defensa ha pagado hacia fuera, o está considerando, remuneración en lo referente por lo menos a 104 muertes civiles alegado causadas por el ejército británico en Afganistán durante los 18 meses pasados, él se ha revelado.

Y las demandas de la remuneración se han rechazado en 113 casos más en la provincia de Helmand, donde Reino Unido las fuerzas están conduciendo la lucha contra el Taliban.

Las figuras que cubren del diciembre de 2007 al mayo de 2009 se revelan en los documentos lanzados por la MOD en respuesta a una libertad de la petición de la información de Channel 4 Noticias.

The documents show that payouts in cases involving fatalities over the period total around 200,000 US dollars (£120,000), and range from 210 dollars for the death of a woman to 39,792 dollars for an incident involving “multiple fatalities, injuries and property” in Lashkar Gah province in October last year.

In Musa Qaleh, in summer 2007, an incident allegedly involving the deaths of five adults and 15 children resulted in a claim for over 100,000 dollars, which was rejected. The following year, the deaths of two children in the same town resulted in a payout of 10,000.

In a statement, the Ministry of Defence said: “Compensation claims brought against British forces working as part of the International Security Assistance Force are considered on the basis of whether the MoD has a legal liability to pay compensation. Where there is a proven legal liability compensation is paid.

“Despite every effort to target only insurgents, there are times when the ordinary people of Afghanistan are inadvertently harmed.

“We are deeply saddened by any civilian deaths and we particularly regret incidents where civilians are harmed as a result of actions by international forces. Even one death is one too many.”

Defence minister Bill Rammell rejected suggestions that the figures revealed only the tip of a much larger iceberg.

Mr Rammell told Channel 4: “We are engaged in a hearts and minds exercise. Wanting to do everything we can to avoid civilian casualties is not only a moral view, but a practical and political view. If we want to take people with us, we need to ensure we are doing that.”

He added: “We go out of our way to advertise the opportunities for compensation.

“I hugely regret any civilian casualties, but we are engaged in an increasingly difficult battle with the Taliban. We are there under a United Nations mandate as part of a coalition of 41 countries.

“We are actually there with the support of the Afghan Government and its people. The last independent opinion poll I saw still showed a large majority of ordinary Afghanis saying that they wanted the international presence there, because they are terrified out of their wits about what the Taliban would do to them.”

Andrew Woodcock, Press Association

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