Kabul/Islamabad: A leading international human rights organisation raised serious concerns under international humanitarian law over the recent Pakistani airstrike on a rehabilitation centre in Afghanistan’s capital, Kabul, that killed over 400 civilians and injured more than 200 others.
Responding to claims by Pakistani officials that the March 16 airstrike on a drug rehabilitation centre in Kabul had targeted an ammunition depot, Isabelle Lassee, Amnesty International’s Deputy Regional Director for South Asia, said that the Pakistani military failed to take adequate precautions to avoid civilian harm, noting that any reasonable assessment would have indicated a high civilian presence at the site.
According to Amnesty International, Pakistan carried out airstrikes on March 16 in Kabul and Nangarhar as part of “Operation Ghazab Lil Haq”. The strikes hit Omid Addiction Treatment Hospital in Kabul, which was established in 2016 on the site of Camp Phoenix, a former US and NATO military base on the outskirts of the Afghan capital. The rehabilitation centre, along with adjoining complexes on the site, is reported to have had the capacity to accommodate around 2,000 people.
Citing the Afghan authorities, the rights body said that the strike killed over 400 civilians and injured more than 200 others.
Isabelle said that although the total death toll has yet to be independently verified, the attack resulted in a significant number of deaths and injuries to civilians, numbering in the hundreds.
“It’s well-documented that a large part of Camp Phoenix, a former NATO camp, had been operating as a drug rehabilitation facility since 2016. Pakistan’s military should have taken all feasible precautions to spare civilians and civilian objects before launching this strike. Any reasonable assessment and information gathering would have concluded that the camp had a high civilian presence,” she stated.
“Even if an ammunition depot was present inside the wider camp,” Isabelle said, the decision to carry out the strike by the Pakistani military “should have been weighed against any excessive harm that it was likely to cause to civilians.”
She mentioned that the “scale of death and destruction raises serious concerns about whether the Pakistani military conducted an adequate proportionality assessment and took all necessary steps to gather information about the intended target and minimise civilian harm.”
“The Pakistani authorities must now explain what information they acted upon and the steps taken for verification. They must also carry out an independent, impartial and timely investigation into the circumstances of this strike and the resulting civilian casualties, with the results made public with a view to ensuring accountability,” Isabelle emphasised.
Amnesty International called on all parties to the conflict to strictly adhere to international humanitarian law and to take urgent measures to protect civilians and civilian infrastructure, including hospitals and other healthcare facilities.
(IANS)
