Mobile phone footage proves more than 90 died in air strike

THE "emerging evidence" alluded to by General David McKiernan, the most senior US officer in Afghanistan, seemed to leave no room for dispute over allegations that more than 90 people, many of them women and children, died in the 22 August raid in western Herat's Shindand district.

This figure was backed by the United Nations and media reports after the footage was released.

The New York Times said on Sunday that videos recorded on mobile phones showed bodies of women and children laid out in the village mosque where the strike occurred. It said its reporter had seen mobile phone images of at least 11 dead children, some apparently with blast and concussion injuries. Ten days after the air strikes, villagers dug the last victim from the rubble, a baby.

An Afghan doctor who runs a clinic in a nearby village told the newspaper he counted 50 to 60 bodies of civilians, most of them women and children and some of them his own patients, laid out in the village mosque on the day of the strike.

More than 500 civilians have been killed by foreign and Afghan forces against the militants so far this year, according to the Afghan government and some aid groups.