An emotional Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Saturday told international troops to "stop their operations in our land", his strongest remarks yet over mistaken killings of civilians.
Karzai's comments came after a week in which a relative of his was killed in a raid by foreign forces and he rejected an apology by the US commander of troops General David Petraeus for the deaths of nine children in a NATO strike.
"I would like to ask NATO and the US with honour and humbleness and not with arrogance to stop their operations in our land," Karzai said in Pashto as he visited the dead children's relatives in Kunar province, eastern Afghanistan.
"We are very tolerant people but now our tolerance has run out."
In an apparent reference to neighbouring Pakistan, where insurgents have hideouts in lawless border regions, Western-backed Karzai said international forces "should go and fight this war where we have showed them (it is)".
"This war is not in our land," Karzai added.
Karzai's spokesman Waheed Omer said the president's remarks had been urging an end to civilian casualties in international operations.
"The president, on behalf of the Afghan people, renewed his call on NATO to stop operations that bring about unnecessary losses to the Afghan people," Omer said.
"We have always maintained that the war on terror cannot be fought in the towns and villages of Afghanistan." ....
