By NNN-PTI,
Berlin: Germany will compensate for its non-participation in the US-led military operation in Libya by sending around 300 additional troops to Afghanistan to relieve its NATO partners involved in airborne surveillance there for similar operations in the war-torn North African nation.
The German cabinet on Wednesday decided that German soldiers will replace the crew operating the Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) aircraft flying over Afghanistan.
Germany’s proposal to send additional soldiers to Afghanistan was endorsed by the NATO, which has the overall command of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan as well as the AWACS operations.
Meanwhile, in WASHINGTON, a US soldier on Wednesday pleaded guilty to the murders of three unarmed Afghan civilians in a war crimes probe that implicates a dozen members of his platoon and has raised some of the most serious criminal allegations to come from the war in Afghanistan.
Spc Jeremy Morlock, 22, was court-martialed at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, where he pleaded guilty to three counts of murder, and one count each of conspiracy, obstructing justice and illegal drug use in exchange for a maximum sentence of 24 years in prison.
Morlock was accused of taking a lead role in the killings of three unarmed Afghan men in Kandahar province in January, February and May 2010.
Asked by a military judge whether the plan was to shoot at people to scare them, or shoot to kill, Morlock replied: “The plan was to kill people.