WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — A US ground-attack aircraft gunned down patients and medical staff as they fled a burning hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan, Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said in a report released on Thursday.
"Patients burned in their beds, medical staff were decapitated and lost limbs, and others were shot by the circling AC-130 gunship while fleeing the burning building," the report stated.
On October 3, US forces bombed a MSF hospital in Kunduz, killing at least 30 medical staff and patients, including three children, in what might be the deadliest incident of civilian casualties since the Afghan conflict began in 2001.
The MSF, according to the report, concluded an initial review of the bombing comprising of a view from inside the Kunduz hospital, but the report lacks "the view from outside the hospital — what happened within the [US] military chains of command."
The question remains, according to the report, as to why the MSF hospital lost its protected status in the eyes of US military forces during the attack.
MSF demanded, the report noted, that functioning hospitals treating causalities of war never lose this protection for any reason.
"Wounded combatants are patients and must be free from attack and treated without discrimination," the report pointed out. "Medical staff should never be punished or attacked for providing treatment to wounded combatants."
On October 6, General John Campbell, the most senior US commander in Afghanistan, admitted that the Kunduz hospital had been "mistakenly struck" by US forces.
The United States, NATO and the Afghan government have all launched investigations into the MSF hospital bombing.
