US Airstrike Vaporizes Hospital – Killing 9 Doctors

[MikeWB]

Interesting. CIA propaganda from few days ago attacked Russians for killing "civilians".

https://nationaltribune.com/us-news/us-airstrike-vaporizes-hospital-killing-9-doctors-without-borders-charity-workers-and-injuring-37-others

US Airstrike Vaporizes Hospital – Killing 9 Doctors

A US airstrike appears to have hit a hospital run by Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders) in the Afghan city of Kunduz, killing nine staff members and injuring up to 37 people.

Related: MSF staff killed in suspected US strike on Afghan hospital – latest
MSF said its hospital in the northern city was bombed and badly damaged in an aerial attack on Saturday morning.


The charity claimed it had circulated the coordinates of the site to all sides engaged in fighting in the country, adding that the bombing continued for 30 minutes after it had raised the alarm with Afghan and US authorities.

At the time of the bombing, 105 patients and their carers, and more than 80 MSF international and national staff were in the hospital, the charity said.

Some members of staff were still unaccounted for on Saturday and there are fears the death toll will rise considerably. Up to 10 international aid workers who were based in the hospital are believed to have survived the attack.



It is with deep sadness that we confirm so far the death of nine MSF staff during the bombing last night of MSF's hospital in #Kunduz.

— MSF UK Press Office (@MSF_Press) October 3, 2015

"We are deeply shocked by the attack, the killing of our staff and patients and the heavy toll it has inflicted on healthcare in Kunduz," Bart Janssens, MSF's director of operations, said.

"We do not yet have the final casualty figures, but our medical team are providing first aid and treating the injured patients and MSF personnel and accounting for the deceased. We urge all parties to respect the safety of health facilities and staff."

Related: Aftermath of MSF hospital bombing in Afghanistan – in pictures
He said the hospital was well known: "It was the only functional hospital in Kunduz since the fighting had begun and we have shared extensively the locations of this hospital with all warring parties in Afghanistan."

The charity later added: "The bombing continued for more than 30 minutes after American and Afghan military officials in Kabul and Washington were first informed. MSF urgently seeks clarity on exactly what took place and how this terrible event could have happened."

A spokesman for the US military admitted it might be responsible.

"US forces conducted an airstrike in Kunduz city at 2:15am (local), 3 October, against individuals threatening the force. The strike may have resulted in collateral damage to a nearby medical facility. This incident is under investigation," said Colonel Brian Tribus, spokesman for international forces in Afghanistan.

The bombardment apparently followed heavy fighting around the hospital. An MSF staff member, who was on duty at the time, told the Guardian: "I was inside my office. Around 2am, the plane started bombing the main building of MSF. It lasted one and a half hours. After 3.30am, I came out from my office and saw all of the hospital was on fire," the staff member said.

"We couldn't save our doctors, our nurses, our cleaners, our friends. They burned inside the hospital. We couldn't save our brothers and friends," the staff member said, asking to remain anonymous.

[MikeWB]

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/afghanistan-kunduz-charity-hospital-air-strike-msf-nurse-describes-patients-burning-in-their-beds-a6678921.html

Afghanistan Kunduz hospital air strike: MSF nurse describes 'patients burning in their beds'

MSF nurse Lajos Zoltan Jecs was in the hospital during the series of bombing raids - here's what he saw

    * Lajos Zoltan Jecs
    * Sunday 4 October 2015 13:19 BST
    *

Medical staff in the immediate aftermath of an airstrike against their hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan AP

Medecin Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders) nurse Lajos Zoltan Jecs was in the charity's Kunduz trauma hospital when the facility was struck by a series of aerial bombing raids in the early hours of Saturday morning. He describes his experience.

It was absolutely terrifying.

I was sleeping in our safe room in the hospital. At around 2am I was woken up by the sound of a big explosion nearby. At first I didn't know what was going on. Over the past week we'd heard bombings and explosions before, but always further away. This one was different - close and loud.

At first there was confusion, and dust settling. As we were trying to work out what was happening, there was more bombing.

After 20 or 30 minutes, I heard someone calling my name. It was one of the Emergency Room nurses. He staggered in with massive trauma to his arm. He was covered in blood, with wounds all over his body.

At that point my brain just couldn't understand what was happening. For a second I was just stood still, shocked.
Read more
US condemned after attack on Afghan hospital kills 19 people

He was calling for help. In the safe room, we have a limited supply of basic medical essentials, but there was no morphine to stop his pain. We did what we could.

I don't know exactly how long, but it was maybe half an hour afterwards that they stopped bombing. I went out with the project coordinator to see what had happened.

What we saw was the hospital destroyed, burning. I don't know what I felt – just shock again.

We went to look for survivors. A few had already made it to one of the safe rooms. One by one, people started appearing, wounded, including some of our colleagues and caretakers of patients.

We tried to take a look into one of the burning buildings. I cannot describe what was inside. There are no words for how terrible it was. In the Intensive Care Unit six patients were burning in their beds.

We looked for some staff that were supposed to be in the operating theatre. It was awful. A patient there on the operating table, dead, in the middle of the destruction. We couldn't find our staff. Thankfully we later found that they had run out from the operating theatre and had found a safe place.
Kunduz-hospital-bombing.jpg
The Doctors Without Borders hospital is seen in flames, after an explosion in the northern Afghan city of Kunduz

Just nearby, we had a look in the inpatient department. Luckily untouched by the bombing. We quickly checked that everyone was OK. And in a safe bunker next door, also everyone inside was OK.

And then back to the office. Full - patients, wounded, crying out, everywhere.

It was crazy. We had to organise a mass casualty plan in the office, seeing which doctors were alive and available to help. We did an urgent surgery for one of our doctors. Unfortunately he died there on the office table. We did our best, but it wasn't enough.

The whole situation was very hard. We saw our colleagues dying. Our pharmacist - I was just talking to him last night and planning the stocks, and then he died there in our office.

The first moments were just chaos. Enough staff had survived, so we could help all the wounded with treatable wounds. But there were too many that we couldn't help. Somehow, everything was very clear. We just treated the people that needed treatment, and didn't make decisions - how could we make decisions in that sort of fear and chaos?

Some of my colleagues were in too much shock, crying and crying. I tried to encourage some of the staff to help, to give them something to concentrate on, to take their minds off the horror. But some were just too shocked to do anything. Seeing adult men, your friends, crying uncontrollably - that is not easy.
Read more

    * Kunduz still under Taliban control, residents report
    * Residents suffer as Taliban return to power in Afghan city of Kunduz
    * Afghan army hit back after Taliban capture provincial capital

I have been working here since May, and I have seen a lot of heavy medical situations. But it is a totally different story when they are your colleagues, your friends.

These are people who had been working hard for months, non-stop for the past week. They had not gone home, they had not seen their families, they had just been working in the hospital to help people... and now they are dead. These people are friends, close friends. I have no words to express this. It is unspeakable.

The hospital, it has been my workplace and home for several months. Yes, it is just a building. But it is so much more than that. It is healthcare for Kunduz. Now it is gone.

What is in my heart since this morning is that this is completely unacceptable. How can this happen? What is the benefit of this? Destroying a hospital and so many lives, for nothing. I cannot find words for this."

[Michael K.]

There is something like a feminine evil lurking behind such atrocities and the lying denial and deceit which follow them.  It being beneath a man's honor to attack a hospital full of children, maybe this is how homosexuals fit into the military, they are reliable in this kind of catty terrorism. 

Of course, they have braggingly showed us how they can put a five hundrend pound bomb down a ventilation shaft at night already, so we are not awaiting the outcome of the investigating committee to form an opinion. 

Anyway, CNN explains why Great Whore is on the rag over Kunduz:

http://www.cnn.com/2015/09/29/asia/afghanistan-kunduz-taliban-attack-why-it-matters/

The loss of the major city of Kunduz to the Taliban is a stunning reversal for the Afghan government, deepening worries about the ability of its security forces to take the fight to the Islamic militants.

Afghan officials vowed to quickly drive the Taliban back out again from the northern provincial capital where the insurgents freed hundreds of inmates from a prison and raised their white flag at points around town.

[Ognir]

US now saying that the Afghans asked for the strike, lying fuckin bastards

[Michael K.]

Deniably connected :

http://theantimedia.org/doctors-without-borders-bombing-tpp/

(ANTIMEDIA) Had the President of Nobel Peace Prize-winning Doctors Without Borders not warned us of the "imminent threat to global health" posed by the TPP, would these 22 doctors and patients have lost their lives early Saturday?

"I don't know exactly how long, but it was maybe half an hour afterwards that they stopped bombing. I went out with the project coordinator to see what had happened. What we saw was the hospital destroyed, burning," described nurse Lajos Zoltan Jecs of the U.S. bombardment of a hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan.

[yankeedoodle]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=g6YG0mQlrSU

http://www.msf.ca/en/trans-pacific-partnership

[MikeWB]

This story is still not going away. MSF is calling for War Crimes tribunal in Geneva.

https://theintercept.com/2015/10/07/why-is-u-s-refusing-an-independent-investigation-if-its-so-clear-its-hospital-airstrike-was-an-accident/

Why Is the U.S. Refusing an Independent Investigation If Its Hospital Airstrike Was an "Accident"?
Glenn Greenwald
Glenn Greenwald

2015-10-07T13:37:13+00:00

In Geneva this morning, Doctors Without Borders (MSF) demanded a formal, independent investigation into the U.S. airstrike on its hospital in Kunduz. The group's international president, Dr. Joanne Liu (pictured above, center), specified that the inquiry should be convened pursuant to war crime-investigating procedures established by the Geneva Conventions and conducted by The International Humanitarian Fact-Finding Commission. "Even war has rules," Liu said. "This was just not an attack on our hospital. It was an attack on the Geneva Conventions. This cannot be tolerated."

Liu emphasized that the need for an "independent, impartial" investigation is now particularly compelling given what she called "the inconsistency in the U.S. and Afghan accounts of what happened over the recent days." On Monday, we documented the multiple conflicting accounts offered in the first three days by the U.S. military and its media allies, but the story continued to change even further after that. As The Guardian's headline yesterday noted, the U.S. admission that its own personnel called in the airstrike — not Afghan forces as it claimed the day before — meant that "U.S. alters story for fourth time in four days." All of this led Liu to state the obvious today: "We cannot rely on internal military investigations by the U.S., NATO and Afghan forces."

An independent, impartial investigation into what happened here should be something everyone can immediately agree is necessary. But at its daily press briefing on Monday, the U.S. State Department, through its spokesperson Mark Toner, insisted that no such independent investigation was needed on the ground that the U.S. government is already investigating itself and everyone knows how trustworthy and reliable this process is:

    QUESTION: The — so MSF is calling for an independent investigation of this incident by a neutral international body. Is that something the administration would support?

    MR TONER: Well, we've got three investigations underway. Certainly, we've got our own DOD-led investigation. We obviously strongly believe that can be a very transparent and accountable investigation. Let's let these three investigations run their course and see what the results are.

    I would say — and I know the White House spoke about this earlier — we have reached out to some of the leadership in Médecins Sans Frontières to express our condolences over this tragic incident. But as to whether there needs to be an independent fourth investigation, we're satisfied, I think, at this point that enough investigations are underway that we'll get to the truth.

    QUESTION: You don't think that with the U.S., which is — which has an interest in how this investigation proceeds and what the outcome is, and being involved in all three investigations somehow affects the legitimacy of it?

    MR TONER: I mean, frankly, I think we've proven over time that we can investigate incidents like these — like this, and as I said, hold anyone accountable who needs to be held accountable, and do it in such a way that's transparent and, I think, credible.

    QUESTION: Just along those lines —

    MR TONER: Please.

    QUESTION: — MSF has said that this is a clear presumption of a war crime that's been committed here. Some have suggested that the ICC take it up. Is it a safe bet that the U.S. would vote against/veto any attempt in the Security Council to bring this incident for — up for an ICC investigation?

    MR TONER: I don't want to answer a hypothetical. On the war crime question itself, we're just not there yet, and I don't want to prejudge any outcome of any investigation.

    Please, sir.

    QUESTION: What do you mean, "We're just not there yet"?

    MR TONER: I mean we're conducting investigations, we're looking at this very closely, and we're going to, as multiple folks have said including the president over the weekend — that we're going to hold those accountable and it's going to be a credible investigation.

    QUESTION: Does that mean —

    QUESTION: So it's conceivable to you that this could have been a war crime?

    MR TONER: I said we're not — we're letting the investigations run their course.

    QUESTION: Well, regardless of whether or not you —

    MR TONER: I'm not going to — I'm not even — yeah, please, Matt.

    QUESTION: No, but I want to —

    MR TONER: Sure, go ahead. Sorry.

    QUESTION: Is it not — I mean, it's always been assumed, I think — and I just want to know if this assumption is still safe — that the U.S. would oppose an attempt to refer an incident involving U.S. troops to the International Criminal Court.

    MR TONER: That's —

    QUESTION: I mean, as it's — as it was being formed, you guys ran around signing these Article 98 —

    MR TONER: That's a perfectly sound assumption.

Can anyone justify that? So predictably, American journalists have announced without even waiting for any investigation that this was all a terrible accident, nothing intentional about it. Those U.S.-defending journalists should be the angriest about their government's refusal to allow an independent, impartial investigation since that would be the most effective path for exonerating them and proving their innocent, noble intentions.

Many Americans, and especially a large percentage of the nation's journalists, need no investigation to know that this was nothing more than a terrible, tragic mistake. They believe that Americans, and especially their military, are so inherently good and noble and well-intentioned that none would ever knowingly damage a hospital. John McCain expressed this common American view and the primary excuse now accompanying it — stuff happens — on NPR this morning:

They're certain of this despite how consistent MSF has been that this was a "war crime." They're certain of it despite how many times, and how recently, MSF notified the U.S. military of the exact GPS coordinates of this hospital. They're certain of it even though bombing continued for 30 minutes after MSF pleaded with them to stop. They're certain of it despite the substantial evidence that their Afghan allies long viewed this exact hospital with hostility because — true to its name and purpose — the group treated all wounded human beings, including Taliban. They're certain of it even though Afghan officials have explicitly defended the airstrike against the hospital on the ground that Taliban were inside. They're certain of it despite how many times the U.S. has radically changed its story about what happened as facts emerged that proved its latest claims false. They're certain of it despite how many times the U.S. has attacked and destroyed civilian targets under extremely suspicious circumstances.

But they are not apparently so certain that they desire an independent, impartial investigation into what actually happened here. The facially ludicrous announcement by the State Department that the Pentagon will investigate itself produced almost no domestic outrage. A religious-like belief in American exceptionalism and tribal superiority is potent indeed, and easily overrides evidence or facts. It blissfully renders the need for investigations obsolete. In their minds, knowing that it was Americans who did this suffices to know what happened, at least on the level of motive: It could not possibly be the case that there was any intentionality here at all. As McCain said, it's only the Bad People — not Americans — who do such things deliberately.

But those who already know that this was all a terrible mistake, that no U.S. personnel would ever purposely call for a strike on a hospital even if they thought there were Taliban inside, should be the ones most eager for the most credible investigation possible: namely, the one under the Geneva Conventions, which MSF this morning demanded, by the tribunal created exactly for such atrocities.