UN: 2015 Civilian Injuries in Afghan War Worst Since 2009

Injured Afghan men receives treatment at Wazir Akbar Khan hospital after a suicide truck bomb explosion in Kabul on August 7, 2015. A powerful truck bomb killed at least seven people and wounded dozens of others, officials said, the first major attack in the Afghan capital since the announcement of Taliban leader Mullah Omar's death. Wakil Kohsar/AFP/Getty Images

KABUL, Afghanistan—Civilian injuries in Afghanistan’s long war with the Taliban rose last year, with women and children again bearing the brunt of the violence, the United Nations said in a report on Sunday.

A total of 3,545 civilians were killed in 2015 as a result of the war, the U.N. report said, with another 7,457 wounded.

The figures mark a 4-percent drop in civilian deaths, but a 9-percent rise in civilian injuries, compared to 2014.

The U.N.’s Assistance Mission in Afghanistan said 2015 had the “highest number of total civilian casualties recorded by UNAMA since 2009.”

It also said that 10 percent of civilian casualties were women, up 37 percent from the year before. It says 25 percent were children, up 14 percent.

“The most important finding in the report is that 11,002 Afghans—civilians, noncombatants—have died or been injured in 2015; this figure surpasses by 4 percent the same figure for 2014,” said UNAMA head Nicholas Haysom.

“The truth is the figures in themselves are awful—over 11,000 Afghans died or were injured last year as a result of this conflict,” he said.

Afghans carry the dead body of a victim in a suicide car bomb in Kabul, Afghanistan, Friday, Aug. 7, 2015. A security official says the bomb exploded near a government compound in Kabul. AP Photo/Rahmat Gul