Afghan army soldier, four Taliban killed in northern Afghanistan

DPA, Tue, 16 Jun 2009 06:41:38 GMT

Kabul -

An Afghan national army soldier and four Taliban fighters were killed in a clash in northern Afghanistan, a provincial governor said Tuesday. Taliban fighters attacked a convoy of Afghan army troops in Gul Tapa area in outskirts of Kunduz city, the capital for the province of the same name, on Monday afternoon, governor Mohammad Omar told the German Press Agency dpa.

"Unfortunately one soldier was killed and two others were wounded in the enemy's attack," Omar said, adding that troops also killed four Taliban fighters including Saikh Abdullah, whom he called "an important commander in the province."

He said five other fighters were wounded in the firefight and four were detained.

Kunduz province, unlike many relatively peaceful provinces in the northern region, has seen an upsurge in Taliban attacks in the past months.

In an interview with Al Jazeera International broadcast Friday, a Taliban commander in Kunduz claimed to have hundreds of fighters and 12 suicide bombers ready to strike against Afghan and foreign forces in the province.

"The Taliban killed yesterday were part of the same group shown on Al Jazeera TV," Omar said.

The governor said the Taliban had "around 100 or 150" fighters in the province, but said they were scattered in different districts and were not able to pose a serious security threat in the region.

Around 3,800 German soldiers are stationed in the region that includes Kunduz and Baghlan provinces, where the insurgents are active. The German forces are part of 65,000 NATO-led troops that are deployed to the country from 42 nations.

Germany so far withstood pressures by other NATO countries, mainly the US, to send its soldiers to southern and eastern regions of Afghanistan, where the fighting is heaviest between Taliban and Afghan and NATO soldiers, mostly from US, Britain, Canada and Netherlands.

Two NATO soldiers killed in Afghanistan: officials

Mon Jun 15, 2:58 pm ET

KABUL (AFP) –

Two NATO force soldiers and 29 Taliban fighters were killed in war attacks in Afghanistan, authorities said Monday, as a new US commander took over foreign troops battling the tide of attacks.

A Canadian soldier died in an explosion in the southern province of Kandahar, the birthplace of the extremist Taliban militia that swept into government in 1996 and was removed in a US-led invasion in late 2001.

Attacks by mainly Taliban fighters have intensified in Afghanistan recently, raising concern about a new campaign of violence in the face of US troop reinforcements and ahead of presidential elections planned for August.

US General Stanley McChrystal took command of nearly 90,000 US- and NATO-led troops Monday, tasked with turning around the war.

The Canadian soldier was killed on Sunday while attempting to defuse two roadside bombs, Canadian officials said.

The Afghan interior ministry said the blast in the district of Panjwayi, one of the most unstable areas of the country, had also killed the district police chief.

An Estonian soldier was killed on Monday in an ambush in the Nad Ali area in the southern province of Helmand, the defence ministry told reporters in Tallinn.

It took to four the death toll for the Estonian troops who have been serving in the NATO-led force in Afghanistan since 2003, it said.

Also in Nad Ali early Monday, a Taliban commander and five of his men were killed in a clash with Afghan and international security forces, the interior ministry said.

It appeared to be the same incident as the one in which the Estonian died, but this could not be confirmed.

There was more fighting in another province in the south, Uruzgan, where the US military said its troops working with Afghan security forces and backed by war planes killed 23 insurgents in a clash on Sunday.

The troops called in air support after militants attacked their patrol, US military spokeswoman Captain Elizabeth Mathias told AFP.

She added that three coalition soldiers were wounded in the gunfight.

Taliban fighters, mainly from the Taliban, are waging an insurgency which has become increasingly violent in recent weeks.

Afghan Interior Minister Mohammad Anif Atmar said Sunday that the number of rebel attacks had increased by about 40 percent in the past week from the week before, leaving 48 civilians, 30 policemen and 176 rebels dead.

The United States' fresh strategy against the Taliban fighters includes the ongoing deployment of 17,000 US troops, around 7,000 of whom are already in place.

Thousands more are coming in to protect August 20 presidential and parliamentary council elections.

"There is no simple solution, no silver bullet," McChrystal told an event at the headquarters of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), where he formally assumed command of ISAF and US-led coalition troops.

"The situation is complicated and success will not be quick -- or easy."

There are 56,000 US troops in Afghanistan, serving in ISAF and the US-led coalition, as well as around 33,000 from other mostly Western nations, according to Pentagon figures. In Iraq there are 133,000 US troops.