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A volunteer nurse who saw a suspected US airstrike hit a hospital in Afghanistan killing his patients and colleagues has penned an emotional response to the tragedy.

Doctors Without Borders worker Lajos Zoltan Jecs wrote a blog post following the airstrike on a hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan in the early hours of Saturday morning.

In the blog, he wrote: "I don't know exactly how long, but it was maybe half an hour afterwards that they stopped bombing. I went out with the project coordinator to see what had happened.

"What we saw was the hospital destroyed, burning. I don’t know what I felt – just shock again.

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"We went to look for survivors. A few had already made it to one of the safe rooms. One by one, people started appearing, wounded, including some of our colleagues and caretakers of patients.

"We tried to take a look into one of the burning buildings. I cannot describe what was inside.

"There are no words for how terrible it was. In the Intensive Care Unit six patients were burning in their beds."

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Doctors Without Borders, also known as Medecins Sans Frontieres, work internationally to provide humanitarian aid to war-torn parts of the world.

The US military unleashed several air strikes last week in support of government forces in the city, where Taliban fighters were still holding out against Afghan troops.

However a bombing lasting up to 30 minutes hit the hospital, with the full casualty figures from the attack still not known.

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Mr Jecs added: "Some of my colleagues were in too much shock, crying and crying. I tried to encourage some of the staff to help, to give them something to concentrate on, to take their minds off the horror. But some were just too shocked to do anything.

"Seeing adult men, your friends, crying uncontrollably - that is not easy.

"These are people who had been working hard for months, non-stop for the past week. They had not gone home, they had not seen their families, they had just been working in the hospital to help people... and now they are dead.

"These people are friends, close friends. I have no words to express this. It is unspeakable.

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"The hospital, it has been my workplace and home for several months. Yes, it is just a building. But it is so much more than that. It is healthcare for Kunduz. Now it is gone.

"What is in my heart since this morning is that this is completely unacceptable. How can this happen? What is the benefit of this? Destroying a hospital and so many lives, for nothing.

"I cannot find words for this."