The international charity Doctors Without Borders (or Médecins Sans Frontières) launched a petition on the website Change.org late Wednesday asking President Barack Obama to consent to an independent investigation into the deadly bombing of their hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan.
The Oct. 3 airstrike on the northern Afghanistan hospital killed at least 22 people while dozens (both staff and patients) have remained missing.
According to the petition, several hundred thousand people are unable to receive emergency trauma care because their hospital was destroyed, in addition to the human costs.
From MSF’s petition:
Investigations have been launched by the U.S., NATO, and the Afghan government, but it is impossible to expect the parties involved in the conflict to carry out independent and impartial investigations of acts in which they themselves are implicated.
It was for that reason, and in the name of our killed and wounded colleagues and patients—and for all of our staff and patients worldwide—that MSF called for an independent international investigation into the events of October 3 by the International Humanitarian Fact-Finding Commission (IHFFC), the only permanent body set up specifically to investigate violations of international humanitarian law.
Now that the call to mobilize the IHFFC has been answered, we are calling for the United States and the Obama administration to consent to the IHFFC investigation into the Kunduz hospital bombing, as it must before a truly impartial truth-seeking investigation can be launched.
Obama offered his personal apologies to MSF’s international president, Joanne Liu, on Oct. 7. The White House said there would be “a thorough and objective accounting of the facts,” according to an AP report of the phone call.
MSF’s general director Christopher Stokes previously called for a independent investigation by International Humanitarian Fact-Finding Commission based out of Bern, Switzerland.
Just signed the petition. Thanx for the link.
What do they want to know? Whether the USA flew the plans that struck the hospital? Contrary to MSF statements…the USA took full responsibility for the strike at the get go and never claimed the aircraft weren’t American. Never. So what else? They’ve alleged over and over that the USA struck the hospital deliberately. Is that what they want to find out? I wonder if they thought that hospital could be struck and concealed so no one would know? Unless that was possible its difficult to think anyone would do it. Then there is the problem of motive? Why would the USA deliberately strike a hospital?
I hope they get their independent investigation. And if it determines the strike was unintentional perhaps they could have the decency to make amends for accusing the USA of deliberately striking a hospital and deliberately committing a war crime.
And if it determines that the attack was intentional, what would be the decent thing for the US to do?