Taliban insurgents in support of the peace process, northern Afghanistan, April 2011. (Tamkeen/Wikimedia Commons)

The Taliban vowed vengeance on Western troops in Afghanistan, following a shooting rampage Sunday by an American soldier who allegedly shot and killed 16 villagers in Afghanistan, according to news reports.

The American soldier, identified as a veteran Army staff sergeant and married father of two by the New York Times, massacred 16 civilians, nine of them children, and American officials are trying to figure out why. Afghan lawmakers demanded a public trial inside the country for the American soldier, but U.S. officials said they would keep with usual military practice--the soldier will face military justice.

A Taliban statement posted online Monday denounced the killings, saying they were the latest in a series of humiliations against the Afghan people and denying that any Taliban fighters had been in the area.

The Afghan Parliament said it condemned “this inhumane and uncivilized act.”

“We urge the United States government to punish the culprits and put them on trial in an open court so that the rest of those who want to shed our innocent people’s blood take a lesson from it,” it said in a statement.

The Los Angeles Times reported the Western military promised that the slaughter of the villagers would not go unpunished.

"We pledge to the noble people of Afghanistan our commitment to a rapid and thorough investigation," German army Brig. Gen. Carsten Jacobson, a spokesman for NATO's International Security Assistance Force told reporters Monday in Kabul. "This deeply appalling incident in no way represents the values of ISAF and coalition troops, or the abiding respect we feel for the Afghan people."

Jacobson and other Western officials also insisted that the killings would not derail U.S.-Afghan talks on a pact governing the long-term American presence in Afghanistan. 

NPR said it's unlikely the event will alter the course of the war, but it may make things difficult for U.S. task forces trying to stabilize the country.

"No one is going to accelerate the timetable for departure," says Rajan Menon, an international relations professor at Lehigh University. "The real question is what the next two years are going to look like."

The recent shootings come on the heels of other events that have offended and upset Afghans, including the inadvertent burning of copies of the Quran by American soldiers in February and video footage of Marines urinating on corpses that emerged in January.

President Obama has expressed regret for all the incidents, but his administration has shown no sign that it will change policy as a result of the most recent shootings.

"Without underestimating the magnitude of this event, we'll maintain a course that makes sense," says Rick "Ozzie" Nelson, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. "We have to keep in mind the strategic implications of this [war]."

Details of the attack are still emerging.

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