Troop increases in Afghanistan; soldiers doubt sense of mission: “Politicians need to clarify it more clearly”

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German military troops are suffer from a lack of support from their countrymen, the new Protestant bishop for the Bundeswehr said on Tuesday, and soldiers suffer doubts about the sense of their mission there, Dutzmann said. “In Afghanistan the soldiers notice how painstaking the civil reconstruction is. Politicians need to clarify the sense of the mission more clearly,” he said. Chaplains serving the soldiers there are answering more questions about the sense of life from these troops who face life-threatening situations each day, he said.

US Army deserter André Lawrence Shepherd has applied for asylum in Germany, his lawyer told reporters on Thursday. Shepherd said he did not want to participate in a war that violates international law. He said he had submitted his asylum request on Wednesday, although the Federal Agency for Migration and Refugees told the DPA news agency it did not have a record of such a document.

Shepherd, 31, has previously served in Iraq where he repaired and maintained Apache helicopters. "I believe that the helicopters are responsible for a substantial number of civilian deaths," he told reporters in Frankfurt. "I am ashamed that I was a part of these horrible acts." Shepherd has appealed to both the Geneva Refugee Convention and EU guidelines that provide protection from persecution for deserters if the military services in question are seen as having violated international law.

Politicians on the left side of the political spectrum called for solidarity with Shepherd. Hans-Christian Ströbele of the Green party wrote in a letter to the soldier that the military conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan would only end when more soldiers "said 'no' in a similarly radical way to any participation in war." Parliamentarians of the Left Party and refugee organizations called on the federal government to support the asylum application. According to the asylum group Pro Asyl, Germany's experience with National Socialism gives it a special duty "to respect the decisions made by conscientious objectors and deserters."

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Photos Courtesy and Original Source: The Local