KABUL (News Agencies) - The Taliban in Afghanistan rejected Sunday reports from U.N. officials that soldiers of the ruling militia massacred some 100 civilians after recapturing a central Afghan town from the opposition.
Senior spokesman Abdul Hai Mutmaen said Taliban soldiers did not target the local population in Yakawlang in Bamiyan province after they retook the district last month.
"We did not need to confront the local population. They are our supporters," Mutmaen said.
Speaking from the Taliban's Kandahar headquarters in southern Afghanistan he acknowledged that some people had been killed after the fighting, but he blamed the retreating opposition for murdering them to defame the Taliban.
"The opposition troops are used to these things. They have supporters and adversaries there. They kill their own old rivals," Mutmaen said.
United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan, reportedly accused Taliban forces of massacring non-combatants in Yakawlang.
In a statement released over the weekend, Annan said the U.N. had received numerous reports that the Taliban had deliberately attacked and killed civilians in this remote and impoverished part of the war-torn country.
"Since then there have been numerous credible reports of widespread summary executions of Hazara civilians by the Taliban who apparently accused the local population of supporting the Hezb-e-Wahdat," the statement said.
Ethnic Hazaras are mostly Shiite Muslims while Taliban are Sunni Pushtuns, Afghanistan's majority ethnic group.
"The Secretary General is very concerned about reports that civilians were deliberately targeted and killed during [the] recent fighting," the statement said.
"It appears that more than 100 people may have been killed, including Afghan humanitarian workers. In addition, a United Nations local staff member is missing," the statement said.
Annan urged the Taliban to control their soldiers and bring those responsible to book.
The Taliban spokesman said it was possible that the opposition had killed local aid workers in order to steal their vehicles.
Yakawlang, which the anti-Taliban Hezb-e-Wahdat faction briefly seized last month is now quiet and the local population is able to continue with normal daily life, he said.
