Obama apologizes for Afghan hospital bombing

Two days after Glenn Greenwald went after CNN for “obscuring” the facts on the US airstrike that killed 22 people at a Doctors Without Borders hospital in Afghanistan, he appeared on the same network to criticize President Barack Obama for delivering what he believes to be an insufficient apology to the organization.

President Obama has vowed a “transparent, thorough and objective accounting” of the incident, Earnest said.

Liu’s remarks come a day after General John Campbell, the top USA and North Atlantic Treaty Organisation commander in Afghanistan, said the “hospital was mistakenly struck” when Afghan officials called for the raid.

The strike “was not just an attack on our hospital, it was an attack on the Geneva Conventions”.

“Under the clear presumption that a war crime has been committed, MSF demands that a full and transparent investigation into the event be conducted by an independent global body”, MSF General Director Christopher Stokes said in a statement on Sunday.

“We can not rely on internal investigations by U.S, North Atlantic Treaty Organisation and Afghan forces”. The airstrike is among the worst cases of civilian death inflicted by US forces during their 14 years in Afghanistan, The Guardian reported.

The White House said they will investigate the incident and hold those responsible accountable.

The United States and Afghanistan – which are not signatories – would have to give their consent.

Calling the airstrike an “attack on the Geneva Conventions,” Doctors Without Borders – also known as Medecins Sans Frontieres – says it repeatedly informed warring factions of the hospital’s Global Positioning System coordinates.

190-a-12-(Josh Earnest, White House press secretary, at news conference)-“killed in injured”-White House press secretary Josh Earnest says the president has spoken with Doctors Without Borders following the deadly US airstrike on a clinic in Afghanistan”.

“A hospital was mistakenly struck”, Campbell admitted. She said it would not be possible for Doctors Without Borders and other medical workers to continue their activities in countries such as Syria, South Sudan and Yemen if they were not protected.

MSF said it has had no response yet from the United States or any other countries.

MSF has suggested that the bombing could be considered a war crime, but Earnest said “no one has offered any evidence that it’s anything but a bad, tragic mistake”.

Deputy spokesman Zafar Hashemi said: “This could at times slow down the speed of our military operations as we put the utmost effort into not harming civilians”.

Campbell said the military had received a request for air support from Afghan troops, but reports from hospital staff members said “there was simply no account” of the presence of armed fighters on the premises, Jochum said. In order to properly investigate whether or not the US government violated humanitarian law, the organization has made an unprecedented move and requested the help of a never-before-used global fact-finding commision.