Kabul, April 29: Hundreds of people protested Thursday in the streets of eastern Afghanistan after a military raid resulted in the death of an Afghan lawmaker’s brother-in-law.
Safiya Sidiqi, the member of parliament whose brother-in-law was killed, said that about 100 NATO soldiers stormed her home, near the city of Jalalabad, about 11:30 p.m. Wednesday. NATO has not yet commented on the death, or confirmed whether its soldiers were involved in the raid.
Sidiqi said the soldiers broke the windows of her home, entered and pulled out 15 members of her family who were then photographed and fingerprinted. Eventually, she said, they opened fire on her brother-in-law, though it was not clear why.
She called the raid “barbaric.”
Police are investigating the raid, said Nangarhar provincial police spokesman Ghafor Khan.
Civilian deaths at the hands of U.S. and other international forces are highly sensitive in Afghanistan. Public outrage over such deaths prompted the top commander Gen. Stanley McChrystal last year to tighten the rules on the use of airstrikes and other weaponry if civilians are at risk.
—Agencies