Leon Panetta in Afghanistan

"LandepNews"

Leon Panetta in Afghanistan

The American authorities on Wednesday showed the Afghan counterparts a video showing the U.S. sergeant that committed the killing spree of 16 in Kandahar, Afghanistan, surrendering to the American troops. The video shows the sergeant running toward the base, laying down the weapon and raising hands in sign of surrender. He is wearing an Afghan shawl, and is hiding the weapon in his hand. When he removes the shawl, he shows the weapon. The video, which was taken from a point that can film the base, does not show him going out of the base.

The video was showed to the Afghan authorities to prove that the event that occurred last Sunday was carried out my one soldier only. A delegation investigating the shooting was exposed to an explosion in Kandahar on Wednesday, as a bomb that was hidden in a motorcycle exploded nearby, killing an Afghan intelligence officer, and wounding three other people. The members of the delegation were unharmed.

A day before the incident in Kandahar, the investigators went to the villages where the shooting took place, and in the dialogue with a villager they found out from him that there were two men, not one, which supports the idea launched by the Afghan officials who said that it couldn’t have been only one man to do such a thing.

The Afghan members of the parliament have demanded that the man be facing a public trial in Afghanistan, and demanded president Hamid Karzai to suspend all negotiations with the Americans on a military treaty until the case was made clear.
A spokesman for the U.S. military said that the location of the trial for the U.S. army sergeant has not been established yet. The spokesman reminded that there were other courts-martial trials that were held in Afghanistan, but that the circumstances must be looked at before a decision is made whether they go to the United States or judge him in Afghanistan.
So far, the U.S. army said there was cause for the sergeant to remain in custody, and Leon Panetta, U.S. Defense Secretary, said that the man could face death penalty, if found guilty.
Panetta visited Afghanistan on Wednesday, coming from Kyrgyzstan, where he discussed with the local authorities about the Manas airport, after the president of this Central Asian republic had warned that no bombing of Iran shell be done from Kyrgyz territory.
Panetta said that the incident should not alter the plan to gradually withdraw from Afghanistan, which has already been agreed upon. The anti-American sentiment has grown since the series of incidents that involved Americans showing disrespect to Afghan people or culture.

A U.S. sergeant killed 16 people in Afghanistan, most of them women and children he dragged out of their homes and shoot, and then burnt their bodies. A few weeks earlier, a U.S. soldier had accidentally burnt copies of the Quran. Last year four American soldiers were shown while urinating on corpses of Taliban. All these had a very serious effect on the relations between the Americans and the Afghans.

Thank's for link: