Ten soldiers, over 100 Taliban killed in Afghanistan attack (2nd Roundup)

Oct 6, 2009, 14:14 GMT

Kabul - Ten Afghan soldiers were killed in a Taliban ambush in southern Afghanistan, while US military claimed Tuesday that more than 100 Taliban were killed in an attack in an eastern region.

The militants attacked an army patrol Monday in the Gerishk district of Helmand province, sparking a battle that lasted for an hour, said Shir Mohammad Zazai, army commander in south-western Afghanistan.

He said 10 soldiers were killed and one was wounded, adding that there were also casualties among the insurgents but he could not give any figures for the militants.

The defence ministry confirmed that 10 of its soldiers were killed in the country but did not release details. The attack was the deadliest single assault against the country's fledgling army in months.

Taliban spokesman Qari Mohammad Yousif Ahmadi said Taliban forces ambushed a joint Afghan-NATO convoy on the highway linking Helmand with neighbouring Kandahar province.

He said eight soldiers were killed and two NATO tanks and three Afghan army vehicles were captured.

Meanwhile, the US military claimed in a statement on Tuesday that the attack in Nuristan on Saturday that claimed the lives of eight US soldiers and two Afghan army may have been sparked by Hezb-e-Islami of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, an associate group of Taliban militants.

'A more detailed battlefield assessment following the Oct. 3 attack in Nuristan has determined that enemy forces suffered more than 100 dead during the well-coordinated defense - significantly higher losses than originally thought,' the military statement said.

Earlier the Afghan Defence Ministry had said in a statement that more than 100 Taliban militants were killed and wounded in an attack, which was conducted by up to 600 Taliban militants.

Jamaluddin Bader, the provincial governor for Nuristan said that Afghan and NATO forces began an operation in the district on Monday morning which was still ongoing. He said more than 30 Taliban fighters were killed during the operation and around 40 wounded.

The Saturday attack in a remote village close to the border with Pakistan was one of the deadliest incidents for US forces in Afghanistan since late 2001.

The army statement said that three foreign fighters and at least five Taliban commanders were among the militants killed by ground forces and NATO airstrikes.

The militants were pushed back from Kamdish district, where the incident took place, and the government has full control of the area, it added.

Afghan officials confirmed that Taliban captured 13 police and two Afghan journalists working for a radio station established by US forces in the area during Saturday's attack. Bader said efforts were underway to secure the release of the hostages.

In other clashes on Monday, six Taliban fighters were killed in the western province of Herat and two others were killed in the northern province of Kunduz, the defence ministry said in a separate statement on Tuesday.

Taliban militants have intensified their attacks on Afghan and the more than 100,000 international forces throughout the country. The militants have also stepped up their attacks in the relatively peaceful northern and western regions.

The top NATO commander in Afghanistan, US General Stanley McChrystal, has asked for up to 40,000 extra foreign troops and called for an increased effort by international troops to train Afghan security forces to repel the insurgency in the country.

More than 90,000 Afghan soldiers have been trained so far by US and NATO experts, a process that could eventually help the Afghan army reach its target strength of 134,000 troops by the end of 2011.

For Afghanistan to independently protect itself against Taliban insurgents and provide security for its population, the county needs up to 400,000 Afghan army and police forces, officials say.

But given the fact that Afghanistan remains one of the five poorest countries in the world, such a number was unlikely to be maintained, and international military donors, including the United States, have yet to approve the Afghan government's demand.