AN Australian special forces soldier has been wounded and an Afghan soldier killed in a firefight with Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan. In the first time Australian special forces have come under direct fire since their deployment this month, a band of more than 50 suspected Taliban fighters on Thursday attacked a joint patrol. Defence Minister Robert Hill, who arrived in Afghanistan yesterday for a whistlestop visit, said the small and light special forces patrol had been fired on with rocket-propelled grenades and mortars. The Australian special forces soldier, who has not been named, suffered minor shrapnel wounds, while the Afghan National Army soldier died at the scene. The coalition forces returned fire and Senator Hill said a significant number of the attackers were killed. "The Australians called in and received air support in the form of fixed-wing aircraft and also Apache attack helicopters," Senator Hill said. The Australian soldier is being treated at the special forces base, in an undisclosed location.
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The patrol of about a dozen coalition troops was operating from a special forces base at Gardez southeast of Kabul and close to the Pakistani border. It is only the second time members of the 190-strong team of Australian SAS soldiers, commandos and support troops have come under fire since leaving Perth in the first week of this month. "There was another incident a few days ago when they were fired on with rockets," Senator Hill said. "But they missed the target ... by a fair margin."
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The special forces are operating in remote regions of Afghanistan, conducting combat patrols, reconnaissance and surveillance operations. The SAS troops are carrying out long-range fighting patrols in specially designed vehicles. Operating in small teams, they are combing Afghanistan's rugged mountains for al-Qaida and Taliban strongholds. The incident response regiment members are experts in anti-terror measures, including dealing with chemical weapons and improvised bombs.
The Australians are part of a combined force of more than 34,000 troops from two dozen countries, about two-thirds of whom are American. The Australians were sent to Afghanistan to help quell Taliban and al-Qaida resistance ahead of elections last weekend. The parliamentary elections were relatively trouble free, but more than 1000 insurgents and civilians have died this year, along with more than 60 US troops. Australia's only military casualty in Afghanistan is 33-year-old SAS sergeant Andrew Russell, who died when his vehicle struck a landmine in 2002.