"I would like to begin by joining General Petreaus in offering my personal apology for the accidental killing of 9 afghans boys killed by coalition forces last week. This breaks our hearts," Gates said standing beside Karzai at a press conference. “Not only is their loss a tragedy for their families, it is a setback for our relationship with the afghan people whose security is our chief concern."
Karzai was then asked by a reporter if he accepted the Secretary's apology, seeing as he had just rejected an apology by Gen. David Petraeus just hours before.
"Civilian casualties is an issue that has been for a long time at the heart of some of the tensions in an otherwise very healthy relationship between the two countries," Karzai said. "Secretary Gates is an honored friend of Afghanistan and I trust him fully when he says he's sorry." "We take the apology with respect," he added.
Karzai then invited Gates to dinner at the country’s presidential palace.
Gates is in the country on a surprise visit to talk about the start of the drawdown of U.S. forces later this year and the transition to Afghan control. Gates announced he was sending a team next week to begin negotiating with the Afghan government for U.S. troops to stay beyond 2014, if the Afghans agree.
http://defense-technologynews.blogspot.com/2011/03/dtn-news-afghan-war-karzai-accepts.html
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