U.N. envoy to raise Afghan, Iraqi killings with U.S.

By Stephanie Nebehay

GENEVA (Reuters) - A U.N. human rights investigator making an official visit to the United States later this month said on Wednesday that he would raise allegations of American troops killing Afghan and Iraqi civilians.

Philip Alston, United Nations special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, said he would also investigate whether the U.S. justice system held private military contractors accountable for any murders committed abroad.

"The big issue is the extent to which the United States is prepared to talk about anything happening overseas," Alston told Reuters in a interview in Geneva ahead of his June 16-26 trip.

"I would like to understand more about the extent to which the American system of justice has adequately dealt with allegations of civilian killings in Iraq," he said.

Alston provoked NATO's anger last month when he said 200 Afghan civilians had been killed by foreign and Afghan troops so far this year, in addition to around 300 by Taliban insurgents.

His report was based on a May visit to Afghanistan, where more than 55,000 foreign troops led by NATO and the U.S. military are deployed. A NATO spokesman later conceded that civilians were mistakenly killed by foreign forces while hunting Taliban militants, but put the number in "low double figures".

"The issue of private military contractors has come up, not just (U.S. private security firm) Blackwater, which are accused of activities that might have killed people. I'll be looking at the question of impunity -- is there a legal system effectively holding them to account?" Alston said in the interview.