German Chancellor Angela Merkel is still under fire from opposition parties over a deadly air-strike in Afghanistan back in September.

Opposition parties have called for the resignation of labor minister Franz Josef Jung who was defense minister at the time of the air raid. They accuse him of withholding information on civilian casualties.

The air-strike was ordered by a German commander and carried out by the US military. It killed nearly 100 people, many of them civilians. This is while the German army's chief of staff Wolfgang Schneiderhan has stepped down over his handling of the air-strike.

The resignation of the inspector general of the German armed forces, General Wolfgang Schneiderhan, was announced by Defense Minister Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg in the country's parliament during a debate on the extension of the German military presence in Afghanistan.

Jung has rejected calls to resign from the cabinet.

In an emergency debate in parliament, Jung said he had insisted from the start on a 'factual investigation' of the night-time air-strike which now appears to have killed both Taliban fighters and villagers.

However, Chancellor Angela Merkel has not rushed to defend Jung, who is also a Christian Democrat. Merkel told reporters she wanted an inquiry by the new defense minister.

'I've always said that if we want to win confidence, we have to have full transparency,' Merkel said. She continued that she expected the former defense minister, Franz Josef Jung, who is now the labor minister, to give an explanation 'in the same spirit.'

SG/SS/MMA