US General Says Afghans Called in Airstrike That Hit Kunduz Hospital by Alissa J. Rubin, New York Times
The American commander in Afghanistan, Gen. John F. Campbell, on Monday responded publicly to the mounting criticism over the American airstrike that destroyed a Doctors Without Borders hospital in the city of Kunduz, claiming that Afghan forces had called in the strike while under fire and conceding that the military’s earlier assertion that American forces had been in danger was wrong.
But General Campbell’s comments, in a sudden and brief news conference at the Pentagon, did not clarify the military’s initial claims that the strike, which killed 22 people, had been an accident to begin with. Doctors Without Borders has repeatedly said that there had been no fighting around the hospital, and that the building was hit over and over by airstrikes over a long period of time on Saturday morning.
Doctors Without Borders, which said Sunday that it was pulling its operation out of Kunduz, has called for an independent investigation of the strike. In Kunduz on Monday, Afghan security forces reported significant progress in trying to retake the city from Taliban fighters who conquered it in a matter of hours last Monday…