[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 67 (Wednesday, May 7, 2003)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5849-S5850]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




    THE CIVILIAN VICTIMS OF COALITION BOMBING ATTACKS IN AFGHANISTAN

  Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I rise today to speak about the innocent 
victims of coalition bombing raids in Afghanistan, and to submit for 
the record, an article regarding this situation from the Washington 
Post. I ask unanimous consent that this article be printed in the 
Record at the conclusion of my remarks.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  (See Exhibit 1.)
  Mr. DODD. After many years of armed conflict and internal unrest, 
Afghans are currently in the process of rebuilding their nation. And, 
now that the majority of military action in that country is complete, 
it is clear that many innocent Afghans lost their lives, homes, or 
family members as a result of coalition attacks. Certainly, I have no 
doubt that throughout our military actions in Afghanistan, our troops 
acted with the highest possible level of precision and professionalism 
in order to avoid civilian injuries or deaths. I applaud their valiant 
efforts and their excellent performance. We all do. However, in all 
armed conflicts there are mistakes made, and in this conflict, several 
hundred Afghans died as a result.
  The village of Madoo is a chilling example of this loss of life. An 
estimated 150 people were killed in this village, which was bombed by 
coalition forces, along with other villages located near Osama bin 
Laden's former lair in the mountains at Tora Bora. And, the magnitude 
of this loss of life is highlighted exponentially when one considers 
that Madoo was home to only 300 people. In these raids, not only was 
Madoo reduced to ruins, but half of its population died; half of all 
its inhabitants lost their lives. These were innocent people, and the 
ones who remain--like so many others in Afghanistan--are destitute. 
They did not only lose their friends and family; they lost their homes, 
possessions, and their livelihoods.
  Sadly, it has now been over a year since much of this damage was 
inflicted, and while some have begun to receive this aid, those injured 
by coalition bomb attacks are still in desperate need of assistance. 
With each passing day, there is growing doubt amongst many of the 
victims as to whether or not American aid will ever arrive. This is a 
troubling situation, and I hope my colleagues will join me in calling 
on the administration to ensure that these funds quickly reach all of 
those in need.
  Indeed, Congress has already appropriated funds to assist 
humanitarian and reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan. Unfortunately, 
the disbursement of these funds to victims of coalition attacks has 
been hindered for a number of reasons. Ongoing military skirmishes in 
Southeastern Afghanistan have in many cases prevented aid workers from 
safely reaching the most war-torn villages. In addition, widespread 
destruction caused by decades of conflict has spurred some Afghans to 
falsely attribute their suffering with coalition attacks. Moreover, 
local rivalries between clans and villages require the United States 
and the international community to distribute aid equitably, so that no 
particular group will feel a sense of inequity in the distribution of 
American aid, which would only serve to heighten tensions.
  I also understand the concerns expressed by some members of the 
administration regarding the complicated policy implications that 
providing monetary compensation for victims of coalition bombing raids 
could create. Certainly, the security interests of the United States 
are in the forefront of the minds of every member of this chamber. 
However, with our vast resources, as well as American ingenuity and 
creativity, we should work to develop innovative approaches that will 
ensure American aid reaches all of those in need, while also protecting 
regional and global American interests.
  I am heartened by recent developments that will allow the United 
States Agency for International Development, USAID, to begin 
distributing aid to war-affected communities in Afghanistan. The $1.25 
million obligation for this effort is a good start. However, while 
there are many reasons for the slow distribution of American aid, the 
reality is that the victims of these attacks are still in great need of 
assistance.
  It is absolutely imperative that the administration now acts with the 
same swiftness and clarity witnessed in the fight against the Taliban 
to aid these innocent men, women, and children. We must remind them 
that our quarrel was not with the Afghan people, but rather the 
Taliban. Now that we have freed them from the oppressive hand of that 
brutal regime, we must not leave them alone.
  The needs of the Afghan people are immediate. They cannot wait. 
Indeed, they have already waited too long. If we continue to sit idly 
by; if we do not help alleviate the suffering that was unintentionally 
inflicted upon them, then we will be creating an incubator for the same 
type of anti-American sentiment on which the Taliban and Osama bin 
Laden thrived. We will be laying the foundations for the very mentality 
that we are trying to uproot. We will be serving to destroy all that we 
have worked to achieve.

                               Exhibit 1

               [From the Washington Post, Apr. 28, 2003]

  After the Airstrikes, Just Silence; No Compensation, Little Aid for 
                      Afghan Victims of U.S. Raids

                            (By April Witt)

       Madoo, Afghanistan.--There are more graves than houses in 
     Madoo.
       The mosque and many of the roughly 35 homes that once made 
     up this hamlet in the White Mountains of eastern Afghanistan 
     lie in rubble. At least 55 men, women and children--or pieces 
     of them--are buried here, their graves marked by flags that 
     are whipped by the wind.
       Seventeen months after U.S. warplanes bombed this village 
     and others in the vicinity of Osama bin Laden's cave complex 
     at Toro Bora, Madoo's survivors say they can tell civilian 
     victims of U.S. bombing in Iraq what to expect in the way of 
     help from Washington: nothing.
       ``Our houses were destroyed,'' said Niaz Mohammad Khan, 30. 
     ``We want to rebuild, but we don't have the money. . . . We 
     need water for our land. We need everything. People come and 
     ask us questions, then go away. No one has helped.''
       Madoo is one of several enclaves in the region that the 
     U.S. military bombed over several days in December 2001, 
     killing an estimated 150 civilians. Once home to 300 people,

[[Page S5850]]

     Madoo has lost roughly half its population, villagers say. In 
     addition to the dozens killed by U.S. airstrikes, many others 
     lost their homes and moved away. The people who remain are 
     destitute. They live crowded in the few stone and timber 
     homes they've managed to rebuild on their own. They subsist 
     on bread and the vegetables they grow. Several children looks 
     slight and frail.
       Half of world away in Washington, finding ways to help 
     people in such desperate need became an immediate priority 
     for some policymakers and a dangerous precedent to others.
       Congress directed that an unspecified amount of money be 
     spent to assist innocent victims of U.S. bombing in 
     Afghanistan, just as it recently called on the Bush 
     administration to identify and provide ``appropriate 
     assistance'' to civilian victims in Iraq. But the money 
     has not yet reached any of the intended recipients, U.S. 
     officials acknowledged.
       ``The money is there,'' said Tim Rieser, an aide to Sen. 
     Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.). ``Mistakes were made. Mistakes are 
     made in wars. We all know that. But we have yet to see the 
     administration take action to carry out the law in 
     Afghanistan.''
       The U.S. Agency for International Development, for example, 
     had $1.25 million in last year's budget to help Afghan 
     civilians who suffered losses as a result of U.S. military 
     action, according to the U.S. Embassy in Kabul. But the 
     agency has not spent any of that money helping Afghans who 
     had their relatives killed, their children maimed, their 
     homes leveled or their livestock and livelihoods destroyed by 
     American bombing, several U.S. officials in Afghanistan 
     conceded this week.
       The biggest obstacle to delivery of the aid, officials say, 
     has been a prolonged debate over how to assist bombing 
     victims without compensating them. To policymakers, the 
     distinction between easing the plight of suffering innocents 
     and compensating the victims of war is more than semantic. 
     Both the U.S. military and the State Department are leery of 
     setting legal precedents for compensation and have declined 
     to establish programs that either systematically document 
     civilian losses or give Afghans any opportunity to apply for 
     reparations.
       Short of that, military civil-affairs units in Afghanistan 
     have, in isolated instances, provided general humanitarian 
     assistance to communities that happen to have suffered as a 
     result of U.S. bombing. They are, for example, helping 
     rebuild Bamian University--but only, officials insist, 
     because Bamian needs a new university, not because U.S. bombs 
     destroyed the old one.
       ``Claims have never been processed for combat losses,'' 
     said Col. Roger King, U.S. military spokesman at Bagram air 
     base near Kabul, the Afghan capital.
       The policy debate has gone on too long, Rieser said. ``It's 
     tricky,'' he said. ``We don't imagine going around handing 
     out dollar bills to people. We are sensitive to the issues. 
     If we were to announce some kind of a claims program, every 
     single person in Afghanistan would sign up. It's just not 
     feasible.
       ``But we do know about a lot of these bombing incidents. We 
     know there is a real need there. Why not start doing 
     something about it in the context of our overall aid program? 
     All Congress is saying is, don't leave out the people who 
     suffered serious losses on account of our mistakes. It should 
     have happened already.''
       There are no official estimates of how many Afghan 
     civilians have been killed by U.S. bombs. A survey published 
     last year by the human rights group Global Exchange estimated 
     the number at more than 800.
       A year and a half after the U.S.-led coalition ousted the 
     Taliban and al Qaeda, bombs are still falling on Afghan 
     civilians as U.S. forces combat a resurgence of terrorism 
     aimed at destabilizing the government of President Hamid 
     Karzai. In eastern Afghanistan this month, a U.S. warplane 
     mistakenly killed 11 members of one family when a 1,000-pound 
     laser-guided bomb missed its intended target and landed on a 
     house.
       And Madoo still lies in ruins.
       The village, 25 miles south of Jalalabad, is not accessible 
     by road. It is a short but arduous hike through mountain 
     gorges from the Pakistan border. On the horizon jut the black 
     peaks of Tora Bora, home of the cave complex where an 
     estimated 1,000 of bin Laden's fighters are believed to have 
     gathered after the defeat of the Taliban last fall.
       It was late afternoon on Dec. 1, 2001, when U.S. warplanes 
     appeared over Madoo. The people of Madoo were observing 
     Ramadan, the Muslim holy month of fasting.
       ``It was the time of breaking fast, and we were just 
     sitting together to have dinner,'' Munir, 12, recalled. ``We 
     heard the voice of the planes, and we went out to see what 
     was happening. A bomb landed on our home. There weren't any 
     Taliban or Arabs with us. For nothing they dropped bombs 
     here.''
       After the first bombers left, Munir's mother and 8-year-old 
     sister were dead. His infant brother, Abdul Haq, was buried 
     alive. Relatives spied the boy's foot sticking out of a mound 
     of dirt and dug him out.
       The bombers returned three times, villagers said. In all, 
     the people of Madoo say they buried at least 55 loved ones.
       Many bodies were too damaged to identify. Some of the 
     dozens of mounds in Madoo's hillside burial ground are marked 
     with two and three pieces of wood, signifying that the 
     remains of more than one person are interred there.
       The people of Madoo remain puzzled by Americans. A retired 
     Ohio lawyer, who read about one Madoo boy injured in the 
     bombings, was so moved that he visited and gave each survivor 
     about $300. People bought tents and clothes and wheat seeds 
     to plant. But Madoo's losses outstripped one man's largess.
       Munir's youngest brother, now a toddler, coughs frequently 
     and swipes at his runny nose. His family, whose home and 
     meager possessions were destroyed in the bombing, lives with 
     relatives.
       ``Before, it was good here,'' Munir said. ``The people and 
     my father worked on the land. Life was better than it is now. 
     We have lost everything.''
       Munir's father, Shingul, 55, who is raising his four 
     surviving children alone, tried to talk about his late wife 
     and daughter but could only turn away and weep.
       ``If we were doing something wrong, I could understand 
     this,'' he said when he regained his voice. ``But it was 
     Ramadan and we were breaking the fast. The main problem we 
     have now is that we have nothing. We would really appreciate 
     it if someone could help.''

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