Mohammad Aslam does not trust the NATO forces in Afghanistan. Like his many other compatriots, this young Afghan thinks the international forces are all about killing civilians in his miserable country.

An Afghan youth looks at a U.S. Marine on a joint foot patrol with British soldiers in Musa Qala in Helmand province March 26, 2009. [Xinhuanet.com, File Photo]

"Afghans no longer need the foreign forces on their soil, because they just kill Afghans rather than protect them against the enemies and the terrorists," Aslam, 27, an ordinary Afghan citizen told Xinhua.

He sounded greatly dismayed when asked to comment on NATO's popularity among the Afghans following incidents in which the international forces had mistakenly killed civilians.

There is a profound impression in the country that the killing of more than 140 civilians in a recent NATO air raid in Balablok district of Afghanistan's western Farah province has caused substantial damage to the image of the alliance in the eyes of war- weary Afghans.

However, the U.S.-led forces denied the figures saying the warplanes targeted a Taliban hideout inflicting casualties mostly on the insurgents as 20 to 30 civilians were also killed in the bombardment.

A press release of the Afghan Defense Ministry later confirmed that "in line with the president order, a joint delegation under General Shahzada, after visiting Balablok and probing the case, confirmed that 140 civilians had been killed and 25 others sustained injuries."

On May 8, President Hamid Karzai, while talking to the CNN, denounced the "bloody" incident, saying "we believe strongly that air strikes are not an effective way of fighting terrorism: that air strikes, rather, cause civilian casualties and do not do good to the U.S.: do not do good to Afghanistan."

"Air strikes (against civilians) are not acceptable," the Afghan president proclaimed.

Frequent mistakes and targeting of civilians by U.S. military and the NATO-led ISAF (International Security Assistance Force) troops, are badly damaging the credibility of the international forces in Afghanistan.

This is not for the first time that civilians have fallen prey to military operations against Taliban insurgents in the embattled Central Asian state.

Ninety-one civilians, including women and children, were perished in Shindand district of the northwestern Herat province in August last year when the U.S. military carried out air raids against purported insurgents.

The deadly air strikes against Taliban insurgents, which led to the mass killing of civilians, have triggered demonstrations in Herat province wherein the protestors, besides chanting anti-U.S., anti-NATO and anti-Afghan government slogans, called for the withdrawal of international troops from Afghanistan.

The tragedy also prompted the Afghan parliament to debate the legitimacy of the presence of over 70,000-strong U.S. and NATO-led forces in Afghanistan.

Afghan analysts fear that continuous targeting of innocent civilians might make it easy for the Taliban to allure more youths into their rank and file -- particularly from among the victimized families, naturally inclined to avenge their misery.

Afghan Wolesi Jirga or the Lower House of parliament, besides strongly condemning civilian casualties in the bombing by the U.S.- led force early this month, had also called on the government to devise a plan to regulate the activities of the foreign forces.

The public representatives also called for prosecuting foreign soldiers if they acted in violation of the law of the land.

For their part, both NATO and U.S. officials admit to the mistake and say they would do their best to avoid harming civilians or at least reduce it as much as possible.

Chairman of NATO's Military Committee in Brussels, Admiral Giampaolo Di Paola, according to media reports, recently said: "We really care about civilian casualties, in the sense that we want them [such incidents] to be zero."

The newly appointed U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan, Karl Eikenberry, in a sign of sharing the pains of the Afghans, visited the affected area in Farah province last week and assured to avoid targeting non-combatants.

A former U.S. army general, who has twice served as commander of the U.S.-led forces in Afghanistan, was quoted by media reports as saying that Washington would work closely with the Afghan authorities to avoid inflicting casualties on civilians.

Nevertheless, continuous air-strikes causing civilian casualties are liable to widen the gap between the people and their government and eventually facilitate the Taliban to allure members of the targeted families.

"It is natural that you are inclined to take revenge if someone kills your brother or father," Abdul Hanan, a Kabul resident said.

The 63-year-old man is convinced that Taliban's regrouping and their spiraling operations are largely due to the killing of civilian people.

Afghans -- right from the ordinary citizens to the country's president -- are unanimous that harming innocent non-combatants would not serve the purpose of war on terror rather than benefit the insurgents.

These incidents, which recur despite claims by NATO and U.S. officials, have diminished chances of the international community to annihilate the Taliban and even have helped the militants to reorganize themselves and effectively challenge the government and U.S.-led forces today.

By and large, public mood in Afghanistan vis--vis these strikes is of anger and indignation -- showing that if not checked these incidents may tremendously bring down the popularity graph of the international forces in Afghanistan -- eventually weakening the fragile state of security in the war-battered country.

(Xinhua News Agency May 31, 2009)