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AFGHANISTAN
TheStar.com - News - Fallen soldier's identity shrouded
Fallen soldier's identity shrouded
Days-long delay in revealing name, country suspicious, Canadian observers say
Jul 27, 2007 04:30 AM
Allan Woods
Ottawa Bureau
OTTAWA–An air of secrecy, unusual even for NATO's Afghanistan mission, surrounds the death of a lone soldier in the country's violent south.
The soldier was among six peacekeepers killed Monday, but only five were claimed by their countries.
For more than four days, the sixth soldier's sacrifice in southern Afghanistan, where Canada's troops are located, has gone unheralded. No name has emerged, no grieving family has stepped forward and no country has claimed the dead soldier as its own.
"I think that one has been slow," said Maj. John Thomas, a spokesperson with the International Security Assistance Force in Kabul. He did confirm that the soldier was a member of the NATO mission, rather than the U.S.-led Operation Enduring Freedom.
"We can't say anything until (the identity) has been released," he said, adding that is the job of a soldier's government.
Meanwhile, concerns linger in Canada that another of the country's soldiers may have been killed, and the death toll since 2002 may have jumped to 67.
Veteran Canadian military observers said the delay, or absence, of information surrounding the death is suspicious.
"That's a ridiculous amount of time," said Scott Taylor, a former soldier and publisher of military magazine Esprit de Corps.
He recalled reading news reports on Monday that four U.S. soldiers had died after hitting an improvised explosive device in eastern Afghanistan, that a Norwegian soldier was killed in a firefight south of Kabul, and that another unidentified soldier had been killed in the country's south.
"I thought that for sure, by now, they would have identified (the soldier)," Taylor said from his Ottawa office. "It's very strange."...............
http://www.thestar.com/News/article/240403
