Outrage as Kanduz hospital bombing is classed 'not a war crime' with no criminal charges

Doctors Without Borders said that punishments ordered by the Pentagon were inadequate and ‘out of proportion’ to the deaths and injuries caused by the attack

The damaged hospital in which Doctors Without Borders operated is shown in Kunduz. (STR/AFP/Getty Images)

A US air strike that destroyed a charity-run hospital in northern Afghanistan, killing 42 people, was due to human error, violations of combat rules and equipment failures, a senior American general has said.

Sixteen military personnel were given administrative punishments that could end their careers, but no one faces a court martial. Among those being disciplined is a two-star general, according to the Defence Department.

The Pentagon confirmed on Friday that the October 2015 attack on the hospital run by charity Doctors Without Borders was not a war crime because it was unintentional. During the attack, a US gunship mistook the hospital at Kanduz for a building that had been seized by Taliban fighters and fired on it with a AC-130 gunship, which is armed with side-firing cannons and guns.

The gunship fired on the hospital for 30 minutes before the mistake was realised and the attack was halted, General Jospeh Votel, commander of US Central Command, told a news conference. The intended target, an Afghan intelligence agency building, was just 450 yards away.

Pentagon officials have said they cannot discuss the case because of investigations (AP)

Investigators concluded that that the US ground and air commanders should have known, but according to Gen. Votel, no one knew the targeted compound was a hospital.

Zabihullah Neyazi, a nurse who lost his left arm, eye and a finger in the attack, told Associated Press that administrative punishment for the American service members wasn’t enough. He said: "A trial should be in Afghanistan, in our presence, in the presence of the victims' families, so they would be satisfied."

24-year-old pharmacist Khalid Ahmad still has shrapnel embedded in his waist and cannot move his right leg. He told AP that those responsible “are criminals, and they must be jailed.”

"The threshold that must be crossed for this deadly incident to amount to a grave breach of international humanitarian law is not whether it was intentional or not.”

&#13; <p>Meinie Nicolai, president of Doctors Without Borders</p>&#13;

Doctors Without Borders, an international charity organisation known by its French acronym MSF, said in a statement on Friday that the punishments were inadequate and “out of proportion” to the deaths and injuries caused by the attack. They called for an “independent and impartial” investigation.

Votel expressed “deepest condolences” to those injured and the families of those killed, and told reporters that the US government made “gesture of sympathy” payments of $3,000 to each injured person and $6,000 to each family of those killed.

But Meinie Nicolai, president of Doctors Without Borders, told AP: "The threshold that must be crossed for this deadly incident to amount to a grave breach of international humanitarian law is not whether it was intentional or not.” With various countries fighting in the region with different rules, she noted that "armed groups cannot escape their responsibilities on the battlefield simply by ruling out the intent to attack a protected structure such as a hospital."

Votel said that the names of the sixteen who will be disciplined will not be published to protect the privacy of the individuals and, in some cases, because they are still assigned to sensitive or overseas positions.