Targeted civilian killings spiral in Afghan war

75% of all civilian death, committed by the Taliban!
And yet the Afghan People overwhelming side with them!

This is the reason that Afghanistan will be a lost cause once all the troops pull out!

Dawn.com
Civilian assassinations were up 588 per cent and 248 percent in Helmand and Kandahar provinces respectively, the main strongholds of the Taliban and the focus of a US troop surge. –Photo by AFP

KABUL: Targeted killings of civilians in Afghanistan doubled last year, the United Nations said on Wednesday, as an expanding insurgency strikes at Western efforts to build up the Afghan government and security forces.

Of 462 assassinations in 2010, half occurred in Taliban strongholds in the south, where the United States says it has made most gains from a troop surge aimed at turning the tide of the almost decade-old war.

In an annual report on the conflict’s civilian toll, the United Nations said there had been a 15 percent rise in the number of civilians killed to 2,777 in 2010, continuing a steady rise over the past four years.

Insurgents were responsible for 75 per cent of those deaths.

Abductions rose 83 per cent, and violence continued to spread from the south to the north, east and west, the report said.

Civilian deaths in the north, in particular, rose 76 per cent.

But the most “alarming” trend, it said, was a 105 per cent increase in the targeted killing of government officials, aid workers and civilians perceived to be supportive of the Afghan government or Nato-led foreign forces.

The tactic threatens to undermine further the handover of responsibility for security to the Afghan government, police and army starting this year, as Washington and its Nato allies seek to draw down their combined 150,000-strong force.

In many parts of Afghanistan, local governors live behind sandbags on US military outposts and government officials rarely travel to the areas they are supposed to run.