ECHR backs Germany, ISAG over Taliban-hijacked tanker bombings in Afghanistan's Kunduz

European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) on Tuesday dismissed a civil lawsuit filed against Germany and NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) regarding US and NATO jets' targeted bombing of 2 fuel tankers on a sandbar in Kunduz, northern Afghanistan, that killed more than 100 people. Following a legal hearing on a case filed by kin of Afghan casualties, after nearly 4 years, a France-based court on February 16 ruled in favour of US Air Force and NATO fighter pilots, who bombed the vehicles hijacked by Taliban insurgents in September 2009. NATO-led ISAF alleged that the officers acted on an intelligence report, further claiming that all dead in the airstrike were militants, while the kin of two victims argued that the 91 deceased were all 'Afghan civilians’. 

"Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) in Strasbourg ruled in the case Hanan v. Germany that the federal government did not violate its obligations under the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR)," the court said in verdict.

Examining whether commander at Colonel Georg Klein's base in Afghanistan, Georg Klein, had overridden regulation when he issued "Weapons release!" instructions, despite some US airforce pilots’ suggestion to ‘fly low’ and not target, Judges of ECHR ruled that the German officer’s response was ‘adequate’. ‘There was no violation of Article 2 of the European Convention on Human Rights. German authorities complied with the requirements of an effective investigation under the rights charter,’ the Strasbourg-based court said. In its final verdict, the ECHR said that there was ‘no reason to doubt’ German prosecutors and Germany's Constitutional Court, adding that no additional witnesses were needed in the case. ‘The ruling is final and cannot be appealed’, the Court stated. 

“For the Afghan village with dozens of civilian victims, today’s decision is, of course, disappointing because the German military’s policy of secrecy and de facto denial of procedural rights to those affected were not rebuked," Attorney and ECCHR General Secretary Wolfgang Kaleck, who represents Hanan before the ECtHR said.

[US and German soldiers tour the site where villagers reportedly died when American jets bombed fuel tankers. Credit: AP]

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“The past 12 years have been an ordeal for my family and the families of the many other victims. We never received an official apology from the German government. All we want is for those responsible for the attack to be held accountable and to be adequately compensated. They must adhere to human rights during military operations abroad," Hanan's lawsuit stated.

NATO's complete withdrawal from Afghanistan

The lawsuit was filed by an Afghan man, plaintiff Abdul Hanan, who lost two of his sons aged eight and twelve in the airstrike. Approaching ECHR, the man disputed that Germany violated his son's right to life after the German officer ordered US Air Force jets to bomb tankers surrounded by local civilians, who were invited by the Taliban to siphon fuel from the vehicles after they were stuck in the riverbed. Furthermore, he accused Germany of defying him his right to file damages, and failure to conduct an ‘effective investigation’. Following the airstrike, and accusations of breach of humanitarian law on German forces in northern Afghanistan, Cabinet ministers instructed the forces to pull out from Bundeswehr’s former base in Kunduz after handing it to the Afghan military, and stationed German troops at Mazar-i-Sharif, 300 kilometres (180 miles) from Kunduz, instead. In 2014, December, during the Chicago Summit, NATO and its partners agreed to the complete withdrawal of combat troops from Afghanistan. 

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(Image credit: Instagram/@war_zone14)