The White House and Nato on Wednesday condemned grisly photographs showing US soldiers with the mangled remains of suspected Taliban suicide bombers in Afghanistan. White House spokesman Jay Carney said the photos were "reprehensible" but also said the administration was "very disappointed" that the Los Angeles Times decided to publish them.
The incident is the latest in a series of scandals that have strained US-Afghan ties and cast Nato-led troops in a negative light. Pentagon officials insisted the episode did not signal a wider problem with discipline among US troops, stressing that the incident occurred two years ago.
Nato chief Anders Fogh Rasmussen also denounced the photos but said it did not represent the values of the alliance's military mission.
"These events took place apparently a couple of years ago and I consider them an isolated event," he said in Brussels during a Nato meeting.
US Defence Secretary Panetta, who was in Brussels for the alliance talks, said through a spokesman that the photos do not reflect the "values or professionalism" of America's fighting forces in Afghanistan. "Secretary Panetta strongly rejects the conduct depicted in these two-year-old photographs," Pentagon spokesman George Little said in a statement.
"These images by no means represent the values or professionalism of the vast majority of US troops serving in Afghanistan today," he said, adding that the Pentagon has opened an investigation that could lead to disciplinary measures.
He also expressed the US defence chief's disappointment that the LA Times ignored a Pentagon request to refrain from publishing the pictures, which reportedly were obtained from a soldier in the division. "The danger is that this material could be used by the enemy to incite violence against US and Afghan service members in Afghanistan. US forces in the country are taking security measures to guard against it," the spokesman said.
General John Allen, commander of Nato-led forces in Afghanistan, also condemned the photos. The unsettling images, which appear on the Times' website, showed troops posing in one image with a severed hand and in another with disembodied legs, are the latest in a series of scandals that has strained US-Afghan ties. The Times reported that the images were taken during more than one occasion over the course of 2010.
The first incident took place in February 2010, when paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne Division were sent to an Afghan police station in Zabul province to inspect the remains of an alleged suicide bomber.