US Apologises After Children Die in Bombing Meant for Taliban Chief

American military commanders in Afghanistan who have been hunting renegade Taliban leaders yesterday apologised for an air strike which killed nine children.

The target of the attack, which happened at Hutala, in eastern Afghanistan, was Mullah Wazir, thought to have been behind the recent killing of two foreign road workers.

But when American soldiers searched the wreckage of the bombed house they found the bodies of the children and two adults. It is thought the children had been playing outside in a walled yard when the A-10 plane struck.

"They were just playing ball, and then the shots came down," said Hamidullah, a distraught villager who said his eight-year-old son, Habibullah, was among the dead.

The US ambassador, Zalmay Khalilzad, said he was "deeply saddened" by the "tragic loss of innocent life."

At the ruins, local reporters described seeing the children's bloodied clothes and shoes scattered across a mud compound which was pitted with small craters.

"Coalition forces regret the loss of any innocent life," said Colonel Bryan Hilferty, a spokesman for the US-domi nated international force in Afghanistan. He said the coalition's commanders ordered the strike only "after developing extensive intelligence over an extended period of time".

A US military spokesman said the Taliban commander was also killed in the attack on Saturday. But this was challenged by local government officials, who claimed the US plane hit the wrong target.

"The Americans wanted to bomb Mullah Wazir, but they bombed a different house," Jawaid Khan, an official in the Ghazni provincial authority, told the Associated Press. "The people are very afraid. They have no idea why the Americans bombed their village."

The United Nations said it was "profoundly distressed" by the children's deaths, which it said could have a negative impact among Afghans in the troubled south. It called for a swift investigation and for the information to be made public.

Tension in the region has been rising for weeks. A bomb ripped through a bazaar in Kandahar on Saturday, injuring 20 people. Taliban fighters, who claimed responsibility, said the bomb, which had been attached to a bike, was aimed at US soldiers.

On Friday and Saturday, five other road workers were abducted along the new US-funded Kabul to Kandahar highway, which is the only large-scale reconstruction project to have been started outside Kabul since the fall of the Taliban two years ago.

In August, another four construction workers were killed. Last month, a UN-sponsored mine clearance program was suspended after staff were carjacked, allegedly by Taliban fighters.

Of the 15 aid workers killed by the Taliban in recent months, most were attacked on or near the road. The attacks are in effect putting the main route into the south off-limits to aid agencies.

US troops have launched counter-insurgency operations across the south, killing dozens of civilians.

"We don't know how many civilians are being killed around the country, because nobody's counting. Most places are too dangerous for foreigners to reach," said a senior UN official in Kabul yesterday. "But the little we know is very worrying."

Comment: Ewen MacAskill