Hillary Rodham Clinton

Hillary Rodham Clinton, The Obama administration said Monday the war strategy in Afghanistan remains intact despite the mass killing of Afghan civilians on Sunday, allegedly by an American soldier. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton called the episode “inexplicable” but insisted it won’t force the U.S. to change course.

“This terrible incident does not change our steadfast dedication to protecting the Afghan people and to doing everything we can to build a strong and stable Afghanistan,” Clinton told reporters at the United Nations in New York.

Administration officials were reacting to the weekend massacre of 16 Afghan civilians, including nine children asleep in their beds. A U.S. staff sergeant is accused of wandering off his base to two nearby villages and shooting them in the middle of the night, burning some of the bodies.

The incident occurred in the wake of the burning of Muslim holy books at an air base in Afghanistan, which was followed by attacks that killed six American service members.

White House press secretary Jay Carney said Washington and its NATO allies remain on course to hand over security control to the Afghans by the end of 2014. Carney said the pace of the troop withdrawal will depend on a variety of factors, but he would not say whether those include the weekend killings.

Carney would not say whether President Barack Obama believes the killings increase security risks for Americans in Afghanistan. The United States has about 90,000 troops in the country; that number is scheduled to drop to 68,000 by the end of September.

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