KABUL—U.S. and Afghan forces killed at least eight people during an overnight raid in eastern Afghanistan, sparking protests by hundreds of villagers who said the dead were farmers, not insurgents.
North Atlantic Treaty Organization officers insisted, however, that the dead were militants plotting an attack on a nearby coalition base. One NATO officer called the raid a "clean hit" that killed a local Taliban commander and turned up nearly two dozen rockets and other weapons at a village compound.
The overnight raid and ensuing protest Friday were the latest reminders of how raw emotions are in Afghanistan, where scores of civilians have been killed this year by coalition forces, undermining support for fight against the Taliban. Even officials in Afghanistan's Western-backed government, President Hamid Karzai foremost among them, often rail against coalition forces for killing innocents.
Officials in Nangarhar province, where the raid took place, were split Friday on what exactly happened in the latest raid. Provincial government spokesman Ahmad Zia Abdulzai said 10 civilians were killed.
But a senior member on the staff of the provincial governor, Gul Agha Shirzai, a staunch U.S. ally, expressed uncertainty over who exactly was slain.
"We're not sure if the people killed were civilians. That's what some people are saying. But we've seen evidence that maybe they were Taliban," the senior staffer said. "We're investigating. We want to know for sure that nobody innocent was killed."
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Friday's raid began when a combined team of U.S. Special Operations Forces and Afghan commandos moved into the district of Surkh Rod. The force was acting on intelligence that indicated a local Taliban commander had amassed a cache of rockets and planned to fire them Saturday at Forward Operating Base Fenty, one of the largest coalition bases in eastern Afghanistan, said Major T.G. Taylor, a spokesman for Task Force Mountain Warrior, which oversees Nangarhar province and three others.
The U.S. and Afghan forces surrounded the Taliban leader's compound, calling on people inside the building to come out and surrender. Instead, "military-aged males" armed with AK-47s came out and started firing, Maj. Taylor said.
After a brief gun battle, allied force cleared the compound, finding eight dead insurgents and two wounded men, he said. The wounded men were treated by allied forces; one was detained, the other released. Maj. Taylor couldn't explain why one of the men was let go.
The raid also uncovered 21 rockets, backing up the intelligence on the planned attack on FOB Fenty, Maj. Taylor said.
But within hours of the raid, hundreds of people had blocked roads in Surkh Rod, brandishing sticks, throwing stones and burning an American flag to protest the killings. Bodies of those killed were also paraded out during the demonstration.
The protesters, along with district officials, accused the allied forces of killing 10 civilians during the raid, said Mr. Abdulzai, the provincial spokesman. At least three people were injured when police broke up the protest.
The dead were "farmers. They are innocent. They are not insurgents or militants," said Mohammed Arish, an administrator in Surkh Rod, according to The Associated Press.
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Protesters blocking roads in Surkh Rod Friday brought out the bodies of victims of a U.S.-Afghan raid Friday.
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NATO commanders fear their efforts to defeat the Taliban could ultimately be undone by the widespread resentment evidenced at Friday's protest. To counter it, the top allied commander, U.S. Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal, has put in places rules limiting the use of air strikes and night raids, the two actions that most often result in civilian deaths.
President Karzai has demanded an end to night raids. But commanders say such raids, executed carefully, remain an important tool that they cannot give up.
That was clear overnight between Thursday and Friday when coalition and Afghan forces carried out seven raids in eastern and southern Afghanistan, the regions where the Taliban are strongest.
Apart from the Nangarhar raid, four raids in three provinces -- Zabul and Helmand in the south and Ghazni in the east -- left several Taliban fighters dead.
In Khost province, also in the country's east, two separate operations captured militants from the Haqqani network, an insurgent group allied to the Taliban. A mosque being used as a weapons storage facility was uncovered in one of the operations.
— Habib Zahori contributed to this article.
