Afghan prez suggests early NATO exit

KABUL -- President Hamid Karzai suggested yesterday that a speeded-up departure of Western troops is the only way to prevent a recurrence of "painful experiences" such as the sight of American soldiers posing with the body parts of dead insurgents.

Also yesterday, a U.S. Army helicopter crashed on a nighttime mission in southwestern Afghanistan, and as many as four soldiers may have been killed, a U.S. defense official said. The cause of the crash was unknown.

Two U.S. defense officials said four U.S. troops were on the helicopter, identified as an Army Black Hawk, and one official said initial word from the scene was that officials "don't expect" that any of the four survived. Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity.

On the issue of the photos, a statement by the Afghan presidential palace 24 hours after the Los Angeles Times published images showing U.S. troops with the remains of suicide bombers and mugging for the camera, called the behavior depicted "inhumane and provocative."

The Taliban, in its first public statement since the pictures appeared, denounced the "gruesome acts" depicted in the photos. The militant group also lambasted Afghan soldiers who were present in some of the shots.

"Some Afghan hirelings . . . posed in the photos, at their masters' orders, to scorn the remains of martyrs," the statement said.

The Obama administration has roundly condemned the actions shown in the photos, and the U.S. military is investigating the incidents, which took place in 2010 but have only now come to light.

The palace statement said Karzai sought an "accelerated and full transition of security responsibilities to Afghan forces, so Afghanistan can take over its own destiny, and thus no such things can be repeated by the foreign forces in Afghanistan."

The NATO force is to wind down its combat role by the end of 2014, but growing numbers of troop-contributing nations have indicated they will pull out their forces next year. The transfer of security responsibilities to Afghan forces, which has been in progress for a year, is a key prelude to the exit of Western combat troops.