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40 Suspected Taliban Killed in U.S. Strike

By NOOR KHAN
The Associated Press
Monday, July 10, 2006; 11:53 AM

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan -- A U.S. warplane bombed a militant hide-out in a raid by Afghan and coalition forces that killed more than 40 suspected Taliban militants in southern Afghanistan on Monday, coalition officials said.

An Afghan army soldier was killed and three coalition forces wounded in the fighting near Tirin Kot, the capital of Uruzgan province, said Sgt. Chris Miller.

The coalition soldiers were in stable condition, he said, declining to give their identities or nationalities.

Maj. Mike Young, a media relations officer for the U.S. Air Force, said a B-1B bomber plane dropped four "precision-guided munitions." A coalition statement said the Afghan and coalition forces had also traded small arms fire with the militants.

Clashes in neighboring Kandahar province and around Afghanistan over the weekend killed at least 19 militants and a Canadian soldier and wounded at least nine other insurgents and five Afghan forces, officials said.

The south has been gripped in recent months by the worst violence since a U.S.-led invasion ousted the Taliban regime after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States.

Taliban militants have launched suicide attacks, bombings and assaults on security forces in the hardline militia's former heartland. Thousands of Afghan and coalition forces have gone on a counteroffensive.

More than 700 people, mostly militants, have died in the violence since mid-May, according to Afghan and coalition casualty figures tallied by The Associated Press.

Britain, meanwhile, said it will send 900 more soldiers to southern Afghanistan, where its forces are facing intense resistance from resurgent Taliban loyalists.

There are 3,300 British troops in the southern Helmand province, plus 1,200 in the Afghan capital, Kabul. Six Britons have been killed in Helmand in the past month, nearly half the military's 13 deaths in Afghanistan since 2001.

NATO is set to take over command of the international security forces in the south next month from the U.S.-led coalition. Canadian, British and Dutch troops are deploying in the region.

President Hamid Karzai on Sunday called a meeting of a special committee of Afghan, coalition, NATO and U.N. representatives set up to address urgent security and reconstruction issues, a statement from his office said.



http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...071000259.html

http://www.unison.ie/breakingnews/in...ca=31&si=94779

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