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U.S. Aircraft Kill Five Taliban Rebels -Governor
U.S. military aircraft killed five suspected Taliban guerrillas in strikes in southeastern Afghanistan on Monday, officials said. A jet and helicopter gunships were called in after a Taliban group attempted to assassinate Kheyal Baaz Khan Sherzai, the top former military commander of the province of Khost, not far from the border with Pakistan. "Sherzai survived the ambush and as a result of the American air attacks, five Taliban were killed," Khost governor Mirajuddin Patan told Reuters. Taliban officials could not be reached for comment and the U.S. military in Kabul said it had no immediate information. Sherzai, a prominent ally of U.S.-led troops hunting the Taliban in Khost when he was provincial commander, was ambushed on a main road near the town of Gardez, Patan said. The attack came amid a rise in violence in parts of south and east where the militants have been most active since their overthrow by U.S.-led forces in late 2001. The attacks have followed a lull over the winter after the guerrillas failed in a vow to derail an October presidential election. Last week, the guerrillas said they killed a senior provincial official after kidnapping him in the restive southern province of Zabul, the third such murder of a local official in the south in less than a week. The guerrillas also killed five policemen in a firefight in Zabul on Thursday. Posted by: ed 2005-04-11 |
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