Official says bombing of Afghan hospital no mistake

KUNDUZ, Afghanistan -- The head of an international medical charity whose hospital in northern Afghanistan was destroyed in a U.S. airstrike said the "extensive, quite precise destruction" of the bombing raid casts doubt on American military assertions it was a mistake.

The Oct. 3 attack on the compound in Kunduz city, which killed at least 22 patients and hospital staff, should be investigated as a possible war crime, said Christopher Stokes, general director of Doctors Without Borders, which also is known by its French abbreviation, MSF.

The trauma hospital was bombed during a firefight between Taliban and government troops, as U.S. advisers were helping Afghan forces retake the city after the insurgents overran it and seized control on Sept. 28.

Afghan authorities say they now are largely back in control of Kunduz.

U.S. President Barack Obama has apologized for the attack, and the commander of U.S. and NATO troops in Afghanistan, Gen. John F. Campbell, said it was a mistake. He said the strike had been called in by Afghan forces, but has not explained exactly how it happened or who granted final approval. Internal military investigations are underway, with preliminary results expected in coming days.

According to Associated Press reporting, American special operations analysts were scrutinizing the Afghan hospital days before it was destroyed because they believed it was being used by a Pakistani operative to coordinate Taliban activity. The analysts knew it was a medical facility, according to a former intelligence official who is familiar with some of the documents describing the site.

It's unclear whether that information got to commanders who unleashed the AC-130 gunship on the hospital.

"The hospital was repeatedly hit both at the front and the rear and extensively destroyed and damaged, even though we have provided all the coordinates and all the right information to all the parties in the conflict," Stokes said, standing in the burned-out main hospital building.

"The extensive, quite precise destruction of this hospital ... doesn't indicate a mistake. The hospital was repeatedly hit," Stokes said.

The bombing went on for more than an hour, despite calls to Afghan, U.S. and NATO to call if off, MSF has said.

Stokes, who has called for an independent inquiry into the incident, said Friday that MSF wanted a "clear explanation because all indications point to a grave breach of international humanitarian law, and therefore a war crime."

Afghan authorities have refused to comment before investigations are complete.

President Ashraf Ghani's deputy spokesman, Zafar Hashemi, told reporters on Saturday the Afghan government has "faith" in investigations being conducted by the U.S. military, and by a joint Afghan-NATO team.

MSF has denied there were any armed Taliban on the hospital grounds at the time of the attack.