NATO-led and Afghan forces have killed around 50 Taliban insurgents in a fresh anti-militant sweep in southern Afghanistan, the alliance said on Wednesday. Operation “Baaz Tsuka” was launched last Friday by hundreds of International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) and Afghan troops in the Panjwayi and Zhare districts of Kandahar province. “We have cleared one large and two small villages of Taliban. We have killed about 50 Taliban,” NATO spokesman Brigadier Richard Nugee told a press conference in Kabul. The spokesman said there had been no Afghan army or NATO casualties during the operation. Nugee said ISAF forces, which took over from the coalition in Afghanistan’s restive south and east earlier this year, would stay in Afghanistan as long as they were needed. “We are here to stay for as long as the government of Afghanistan wants us to help them and that might, we anticipate, be beyond 2010,” he said.