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Kabul: A US military airstrike this past week killed 47 civilians travelling to a wedding, the head of a government commission investigating the incident said.
The airstrike on Sunday in Deh Bala district of Nangarhar province also wounded nine other civilians, Burhanullah Shinwari, the deputy chairman of the Senate who led the delegation, said on Friday.
The US military on Sunday denied any civilians were killed in the incident. At the time Afghan officials said 27 civilians had been killed.
On Friday, US coalition spokesman 1st Lieutenant Nathan Perry said that "any loss of innocent life is tragic."
"I assure you that civilians are never targeted, and that our forces go to great lengths to avoid civilian casualties," he said. "This incident regarding the air strike on July 6th is still under investigation by coalition forces."
Shinwari said that 39 of those killed in the airstrike were women and children, including the bride.
The group was targeted twice on Sunday as they walked along with the bride from her village toward the groom's house in another village, Shinwari said.
The nine-man commission was dispatched by President Hamid Karzai to investigate the incident on Tuesday. They returned to Kabul on Thursday. The commission included officials from the Ministry of Defence, the country's intelligence agency and parliament.
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