Last year was the deadliest on record for Afghan civilians, a UN report said yesterday, with 3,021 killed in the war.
Behind these numbers is real suffering and loss for families in Afghanistan
It was an eight per cent increase from 2010, and 2011 was also the fifth year in a row that the civilian toll has become steadily worse.
The report said insurgents killed more than three-quarters of the civilians who died, with a steep rise in people killed in suicide bombings. It said roadside bombs were the single biggest killer of civilians, accounting for nearly one in three deaths.
Nato and Afghan security forces were responsible for 410 civilian deaths – about 14 per cent of the total.
The figures were a grim testament to the violence that the Taliban and allied Islamist militants can still unleash in Afghanistan, even as Nato begins to map out its plan for international troops to withdraw and give Afghan security forces the main responsibility for fighting insurgents by the end of 2014.
The number of civilians killed in suicide attacks jumped dramatically to 450, an 80 per cent increase on the previous year as militants set off increasingly powerful bombs in public places.
Insurgent-planted roadside bombs remained the single biggest killer of civilians. The homemade explosives, which can be triggered by a footstep or a vehicle, killed 967 people – nearly a third of the total. The UN condemned the insurgents for using the indiscriminate weapons.
“For much too long, Afghan civilians have paid the highest price of war,” said Jan Kubis, the UN secretary-general’s special representative to Afghanistan.
Last year was the deadliest year for Afghan civilians recorded by the UN since it started keeping a detailed civilian casualties in 2007.
Overall, 3,021 civilians died in violence related to the war. Of those, the UN attributed 77 per cent to insurgent attacks and 14 per cent to international and Afghan troops, while nine per cent were classified as unknown.
The number of deaths caused by insurgents was up 14 per cent over 2010, the UN said.
“It is extremely worrying to see civilian casualties continuing to rise year after year,” said Navi Pillay, the UN’s High Commissioner for Human Rights.
“Behind these numbers is real suffering and loss for families in Afghanistan.”
While the total number of civilian deaths caused by international and Afghan forces backing President Hamid Karzai’s government dropped by four per cent from the previous year, the number of civilians killed by air strikes targeting insurgents rose to 187, accounting for nearly half the deaths attributed to coalition and Afghan troops.