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August 8, 2010 - A group of 10 medical team members, including 6 Americans, were gunned down and slaughtered on their way home from their two-week mission.
Unarmed and without security, 10 Christian medical team members hiked more than 10 hours over rugged mountain terrain to bring medical care to isolated Afghan villagers when they were gunned down by the Taliban.
The team consisted of doctors, nurses, and logistics personnel, three were women.
Of the 10, there were six Americans, two Afghans, one German, and one Briton.
According to the provincial police chief, their bullet-riddled bodies were found near three four-wheeled drive vehicles in a wooded area just off the main road that snakes through a narrow valley in the Kuran Wa Munjan district of Badakhshan.
The Taliban said the reason they killed all but one in the group – an Afghan who begged for his life, reciting verses from the Islamic holy book Quran – was they believed the group was spying and trying to convert Muslims to Christianity.
According to the AP the Taliban told them the team was carrying Dari language bibles and “spying gadgets.”
The team was attacked as they returned from a two-week mission in the remote Parun valley of Nuristan province about 160 miles north of Kabul. According to Dirk Frans, the director of the International Assistance Mission who organized the team, the group veered northward into Badakhnsan because they believed it was the safest route back to Kabul.
Frans said the International Assistance Mission (IAM) is one of the longest serving non-governmental organizations operating in Afghanistan, and is registered as a nonprofit Christian organization but does not proselytize.
The team, according to Frans, left their vehicles and hiked for nearly a half day with pack horses over mountainous terrain to reach the Parun valley where they travelled from village to village on foot offering medical care for about two weeks.
"This tragedy negatively impacts our ability to continue serving the Afghan people as IAM has been doing since 1966," the charity said in a statement. "We hope it will not stop our work that benefits over a quarter of a million Afghans each year."
Frans told the AP that he was skeptical the Taliban were responsible. He said the team had studied security conditions carefully before continuing with the mission.
"We are a humanitarian organization. We had no security people. We had no armed guards. We had no weapons," he said.
Authorities in Nuristan heard the foreigners were in the area and sent police to investigate. The police then provided security for the final three to four days of their journey and escorted them across the boundary into Badakhshan. The escorts left after the team told them they felt safe, Frans said.
According to Fran, the last satellite phone connection from the group was Wednesday evening. The Afghan driver who survived called to report the killings. Another Afghan group member survived the attack. He had family in Jalalabad and took a different route home.
Police said the gunmen forced the volunteers to sit on the ground, looted their vehicles, then fatally shot them.
August 8, 2010 - A group of 10 medical team members, including 6 Americans, were gunned down and slaughtered on their way home from their two-week mission.
Unarmed and without security, 10 Christian medical team members hiked more than 10 hours over rugged mountain terrain to bring medical care to isolated Afghan villagers when they were gunned down by the Taliban.
The team consisted of doctors, nurses, and logistics personnel, three were women.
Of the 10, there were six Americans, two Afghans, one German, and one Briton.
According to the provincial police chief, their bullet-riddled bodies were found near three four-wheeled drive vehicles in a wooded area just off the main road that snakes through a narrow valley in the Kuran Wa Munjan district of Badakhshan.
The Taliban said the reason they killed all but one in the group – an Afghan who begged for his life, reciting verses from the Islamic holy book Quran – was they believed the group was spying and trying to convert Muslims to Christianity.
According to the AP the Taliban told them the team was carrying Dari language bibles and “spying gadgets.”
The team was attacked as they returned from a two-week mission in the remote Parun valley of Nuristan province about 160 miles north of Kabul. According to Dirk Frans, the director of the International Assistance Mission who organized the team, the group veered northward into Badakhnsan because they believed it was the safest route back to Kabul.
Frans said the International Assistance Mission (IAM) is one of the longest serving non-governmental organizations operating in Afghanistan, and is registered as a nonprofit Christian organization but does not proselytize.
The team, according to Frans, left their vehicles and hiked for nearly a half day with pack horses over mountainous terrain to reach the Parun valley where they travelled from village to village on foot offering medical care for about two weeks.
"This tragedy negatively impacts our ability to continue serving the Afghan people as IAM has been doing since 1966," the charity said in a statement. "We hope it will not stop our work that benefits over a quarter of a million Afghans each year."
Frans told the AP that he was skeptical the Taliban were responsible. He said the team had studied security conditions carefully before continuing with the mission.
"We are a humanitarian organization. We had no security people. We had no armed guards. We had no weapons," he said.
Authorities in Nuristan heard the foreigners were in the area and sent police to investigate. The police then provided security for the final three to four days of their journey and escorted them across the boundary into Badakhshan. The escorts left after the team told them they felt safe, Frans said.
According to Fran, the last satellite phone connection from the group was Wednesday evening. The Afghan driver who survived called to report the killings. Another Afghan group member survived the attack. He had family in Jalalabad and took a different route home.
Police said the gunmen forced the volunteers to sit on the ground, looted their vehicles, then fatally shot them.
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