Marine outrage

US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta condemned a video posted on the internet Thursday that appears to show US Marines urinating on the corpses of militants in Afghanistan. He promised to look into the alleged abuse.

"I have seen the footage, and I find the behavior depicted in it utterly deplorable," the Pentagon chief said in a statement. "Those found to have engaged in such conduct will be held accountable to the fullest extent."

In the video that was posted on the video-sharing website YouTube, at least four US Marines in combat gear are shown to be urinating over three bodies at an unknown location in Afghanistan. It is not clear whether the dead are civilians or enemy combatants.

The NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) also condemned the behavior saying the "disrespectful act is inexplicable and not in keeping with the high moral standards we expect of coalition forces."

Pentagon officials said the investigation would look into whether the Marines had violated laws of war, which include a ban on the photographing of bodies and detainees.

An official with the US Marine Corps later said the military had identified at least two of the four men. Speaking on condition of anonymity, he said the men belonged to the 3rd Battalion, 2nd Marines from North Carolina, which concluded a tour of Afghanistan last fall.

Concern in Afghanistan

In Afghanistan there were also harsh reactions with President Hamid Karzai saying the behavior was "completely inhumane" and calling on the US military to punish the Marines.

Amid the population, there was outrage, too. A young man from Kandahar told Deutsche Welle that "no culture, no religion allows the profanation of corpses. Even the corpse of an enemy deserves respect. Those who committed this crime have to be punished."

Marzia Rostami from Kunduz feared the Taliban would use the video in their favor. "They will say, 'look, they talk about human rights but they stamp on the dignity of people with their feet.'"

She said her compatriots might find it difficult to differentiate between perpetrators of such crimes and foreigners who had come to Afghanistan to help. The mother of two said she worried that the work of international aid organizations would be made even more difficult as a result, which was tragic during winter when so many people were dependent on international support.

Analysts feared that the video would also put a spanner in government efforts to enter peace talks with the Taliban. "In my opinion, the opponents of the peace talks deliberately published this video to make a rapprochement between the US and the Taliban impossible," said political scientist Sayffudin Sayhoon.

However, a Taliban spokesman told the German news agency DPA that preliminary talks on a prisoner exchange and opening a Taliban liaison office in Qatar would continue.

He added however that the video was "an inhuman, immoral and brutal act of the invaders" and that such "crimes" would "only shorten Americans' and their allies' lives here in Afghanistan."

Author: Anne Thomas / Ratbil Shamel (dpa, AFP, AP)
Editor: Darren Mara