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Roadside bomb kills 4 NATO soldiers in Afghanistan

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2009-07-06 22:00

KABUL: Four soldiers with the NATO-led International Security Assistance Forces (ISAF) were killed as a roadside bomb hit their vehicle in Kunduz province north of Afghanistan Monday, said a police official.

US Marines meet local elders during a shura, or local council meeting, in Sorkhdoz in Afghanistan's lower Helmand River Valley July 5, 2009. [Agencies]

"The gruesome incident occurred in Khanabad district at around noon time, resultantly four ISAF soldiers and two civilians were killed," provincial police chief Mohammad Raziq Yaqubi told Xinhua.

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"Three children sustained injuries in the incident," he added.

Some 3,000 German troops have been stationed in Kunduz within the framework of NATO-led ISAF to maintain security there.

The purported Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid in talks with media from undisclosed location claimed responsibility for the attack.

This is the second violence in a single day on Monday while a suicide car bombing rocked southern Kandahar province in the morning killing two civilians and wounding 12 others including two Afghan soldiers.

A massive operation against Taliban militants, jointly launched by US Marine and Afghan security forces, is going on in the restive Helmand province while the rebels, in response, intensified assault in other parts of the countries, mostly in the shape of roadside and suicide bombings.