Brave Islamist Warriror Rams Suicide-Car Into Children's Schoolbus

In Afganistan:

A SUICIDE bomber rammed a car packed with explosives into a schoolbus near an air force base in northwest Pakistan today, killing himself and wounding about nine people, including several children.

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"Because of the timely reaction of the driver, the children were saved. Only about six or seven children were injured," he added.

"It was outside the Kamra air base. It was specially targetting the schoolchildren's bus."

The Taliban also forbids any outside medical help in areas of Afghansitan they control. Coalition/American patrols have begun moving into Taliban areas just to get medics to sick children.

Each patrol was a foray into villages regarded as Taliban sanctuaries. Each began with tension and the possibility of violence. But the Taliban did not confront the heavily-armed paratroopers, and within minutes the mood of the patrols shifted.

Once the villagers realized that the platoons were accompanied by medics, they pushed forward sick children and pleaded for help.

A catalogue of pediatric suffering quickly formed into queues: children with grotesque burns and skin infections, distended scrapes and scorpion and spider bites, bleeding ears, dimmed eyes or heavy, rolling coughs. Some were bandaged in dirty rags. Others were brought forward in wheelbarrows because they lacked the strength to walk.

In one village, Zarinkhel, the villagers begged Captain Christopher DeMure, the commander of B Company of 2nd Battalion, 508th Parachute Infantry, for vaccines. Seven children had died of measles in the last three days, they said, including two the morning that the patrol had arrived.

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To limit the government's influence and prevent it from achieving even its modest development goals, the villagers and the Afghan and American authorities said, the insurgents have sacked schools, threatened teachers and students, scared off private contractors and sharply restricted medical care.

"The Taliban has made it abundantly clear that no outside doctors, no outside medical help, can work in this district," DeMure said.

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Its degree of poverty is complete. The villages have no electricity. Many people use the same ditches to wash, clean their plates and butcher meat, brush their teeth and drink. The canals are lined with animal waste. Few of the children are seen wearing winter clothes.

The only known doctor in the district, the American officers said, is a man named Dr. Nasibullah, who, according to several intelligence reports, almost exclusively treats Taliban fighters.

Thanks to dri.

posted by Ace at 06:20 PM

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