'Probable Cause' Found to Hold U.S. Soldier (shootings in Afghanistan)

[steve2470]

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2108959,00.html

(KABUL) — A military court held a hearing for an American soldier suspected of killing 16 Afghan civilians and found probable cause to keep him in detention, a spokesman said Tuesday.

The bloody incident has fueled anti-U.S. sentiment in a country weary of the decade-long war.

The soldier, who has not been named, is accused of leaving a U.S. base in Kandahar province and gunning down the Afghan civilians, including nine children and three women, in two villages before dawn on Sunday.

Col. Gary Kolb, a spokesman for the U.S.-led military coalition in Kabul, said Tuesday that a 48-hour probable cause assessment was completed and that the service member continued to be confined. U.S. Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta has said that the soldier could face capital punishment.

[izquierdista]

1. They shouldn't hold him

The only way this mess is going to be smoothed over is to hand him over to the Afghans for their system of justice to handle.

[RebelOne]

2. Or send him back to the states for confinement.

If he is held in Afghanistan, those Afghans who are bent on revenge will surely come after him.