Taliban fighters killed a US soldier and wounded another during an ambush in Afghanistan on Thursday, after the insurgents lost 10 men over the past two days in clashes elsewhere in the troubled southeast. The latest American casualties belonged to a road-working detail led by US engineers in Paktika province, where two days earlier a joint US-Afghan patrol encountered a band of Taliban fighters close to the border with Pakistan.
| Conveniently close to the border with Pakland, we'd guess... |
... the better to flee run away withdraw after an encounter with the Americans ... |
 A US military statement said the enemy fighters took cover in caves. Six insurgents were killed and three US soldiers and an Afghan interpreter wounded in ensuing firefights. âAfghan and US forces pursued the enemy combatants toward the cave complex killing one,â it said, adding that several hours later the same forces came into contact with additional militants and killed five more. Four more Taliban fighters had been killed and seven captured in an assault by Afghan and US forces in neighbouring Zabul province since Wednesday, Bashir Ahmad, a provincial official said. There was no immediate comment on the incidents by the Taliban, but spokesman Abdul Latif Hakimi said the guerrillas had killed two Afghans in the central province of Uruzgan for âspyingâ for the Americans. |