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| Afghanistan |
| Taliban driven out of Nahri Saraj, says Afghan official |
| 2007-05-13 |
| Afghan and US-led coalition troops have driven the Taliban from the Helmand province after a weeklong battle in which more than 70 militants were killed, an Afghan security official said on Saturday. Separately, eight policemen were killed when a roadside bomb blew up while Afghan police confirmed that they had detained a Canadian citizen with suspected links to “terrorist organisations”. There were no casualties among Afghan and Western troops in the fighting in Nahri Saraj, site of a series of operations by foreign-led forces in recent weeks, the security official told Reuters. Five Taliban commanders were amongst those killed, the official said, adding there were no casualties among civilians. “We have driven out the Taliban from the district and it is under our control,” he said. Foreign troops led by the US military and NATO and the Taliban could not be reached for comments on the battle. Nahri Saraj lies 25 kilometres from Sangin district where witnesses said more than 40 civilians were killed last Tuesday in an air strike by US-led coalition troops. The coalition has confirmed civilian casualties in the battle of Sangin. Separately, an air attack by Western forces killed at least seven civilians, including women and children, in the Marja district of Helmand early Friday, witnesses said. Seven of the civilians wounded in the attack were brought to a government run hospital in Lashkar Gah, they said. “I know of six or seven deaths in my village,” a wounded woman said at the hospital. Afghan officials say US-led troops have killed scores of Afghan civilians in the past two months. A US commander apologised last week for the killing of 19 civilians by coalition forces in March. Meanwhile eight Afghan policemen were killed when a roadside bomb tore through their vehicle in the southern province of Kandahar on Saturday, a police commander said. The remotely detonated bomb went off near Zhari, provincial police chief Esmatullah Alizai told AFP. |
| Posted by:Fred |