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Attack on US base in Afghanistan kills 9 Americans
(China Daily)
Updated: 2008-07-14 07:39 More than 2,300 people -- mostly militants -- have died in insurgency-related violence this year, according to an Associated Press tally of official figures. Attacks in eastern Afghanistan are up 40 percent this year compared with last year. Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, warned during a visit to Kabul last week that there are more foreign fighters, including al-Qaida members, in Pakistan's tribal areas, militants who cross the border and launch attacks against US and Afghan troops. Mullen has said he hopes improved security in Iraq will allow troops to be shifted this year from Iraq to Afghanistan, where violence is rising. Violence in Iraq is at its lowest level in four years and Iraqi forces are taking on more responsibility, trends that could allow Gen. David Petraeus, the top American commander in Iraq, to recommend to President Bush in September that he resume a troop withdrawal that is being put on hold this month so Petraeus has time to assess the overall situation. A top Bush aide, Ed Gillespie, said Sunday that withdrawing more troops from Iraq after that assessment always has "been a possibility." Another cause for concern in Afghanistan is the high casualty tolls for civilians killed in violence. This month, an Afghan government commission found that US aircraft killed 47 civilians during a bombing run in Nangarhar province, while a separate incident in Nuristan province is alleged by an Afghan officials to have killed 22 civilians. The tolls have prompted the International Committee of the Red Cross this week to ask all sides to show restraint and avoid civilian casualties. But violence continued around the country on Sunday. A suicide bomber on a motorcycle blew himself up next to a police patrol in the southern province of Uruzgan, killing 24 people. The bomb attack on a police patrol at a busy intersection of the Deh Rawood district killed five police officers and 19 civilians, wounding more than 30 others, said Juma Gul Himat, Uruzgan's police chief. Most of those killed and wounded were shopkeepers and young boys selling goods in the street, he said. Elsewhere, Taliban militants executed two women in central Afghanistan late Saturday after accusing them of working as prostitutes on a US base. The women, dressed in blue burqas, were shot and killed just outside Ghazni city in central Afghanistan, said Sayed Ismal, a spokesman for Ghazni's governor. He called the two "innocent local people." Taliban fighters told Associated Press Television News the two women were executed for allegedly running a prostitution ring catering to US soldiers and other foreign contractors at a US base in Ghazni city. 1st Lt. Nathan Perry, a US military spokesman, said he had not heard allegations "anything close to that nature." Meanwhile, at least 40 militants were killed following an attack on Afghan and US-led coalition forces in Helmand province, the coalition said in a statement. The militants attacked the combined forces near Sangin on Saturday from "multiple concealed and fortified positions," the coalition said. Thirty "enemy boats" and several small bridges have been destroyed on the Helmand River during two days of fighting, it said. Also Sunday, a soldier with NATO's International Security Assistance Force died in a roadside blast in Helmand province, a statement said. The soldier's nationality was not released and it wasn't clear if the death was connected to the two-day battle. In the north, a soldier serving with ISAF died of wounds caused by an explosion Saturday, the military alliance said in a statement. The statement did not give any further details of the explosion. The soldier's nationality was not disclosed. There are nearly 53,000 troops from 40 nations serving in the ISAF in Afghanistan. |
