‘Patients burned in their beds’ after US bombs hit Afghan hospital, says medic

A nurse who was working in the Medecins Sans Frontieres hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan, when it became the target of a suspected US military airstrike has spoken of the “terrifying” ordeal. Lajos Zoltan Jecs was sleeping in the hospital’s “safe room” when the building was struck by a series of bombs in the early hours of Saturday. "At first there was confusion, and dust settling. As we were trying to work out what was happening, there was more bombing,“ he said. "After 20 or 30 minutes, I heard someone calling my name. It was one of the Emergency Room nurses. He staggered in with massive trauma to his arm. He was covered in blood, with wounds all over his body.”

We tried to take a look into one of the burning buildings. I cannot describe what was inside. There are no words for how terrible it was. In the Intensive Care Unit six patients were burning in their beds.

MSF nurse Zoltan Jecs

MSF says its staff frantically phoned NATO and Washington as bombs rained down on its staff working at the trauma centre in Kunduz. The US military later admitted it carried out strikes “in the vicinity” of the hospital, and was targeting Taliban fighters firing at American soldiers. Some 19 people, including three children and 12 medics working for MSF, also known as Doctors Without Borders, died in the raid. U.S. President Barack Obama has apologised and pledged a full inquiry into the incident.

On behalf of the American people, I extend my deepest condolences to the medical professionals and other civilians killed and injured in the tragic incident at a Doctors Without Borders hospital in Kunduz.

President Barack Obama

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