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| Afghanistan |
| US-led forces targeting Taliban kill insurgents, woman, child in southern Afghanistan |
| 2008-02-25 |
| U.S.-led coalition forces killed several insurgents and two civilians after militants barricaded in a mud-brick home fired on the troops, the coalition said Sunday. A freshly planted roadside bomb, meanwhile, hit a vehicle convoy carrying Kandahar Governor Asadullah Khalid, killing three policemen and wounding two others, Khalid said. He was not hurt in the attack. In Helmand province, coalition forces were looking for a Taliban leader in Kajaki district when they came under fire, the coalition said in a statement. "While coalition forces conducted a search of the building during one operation, armed assailants who were barricaded in separate rooms engaged coalition forces with small-arms fire and hand grenades. The assailants were killed when coalition forces responded in self-defense," said coalition spokesman Army Maj. Chris Belcher. The coalition statement said "a number of insurgents" were killed, as were a woman and child who were in one of the rooms the militants were attacking from. "It is a deplorable yet common tactic of insurgents to place innocent women and children in harm's way," Belcher said. Two individuals, suspected of having ties with the Taliban, were detained in the operations, the coalition said. Afghan authorities have pleaded with international forces to coordinate closely with their Afghan counterparts to prevent civilian casualties, but Taliban militants often fight from villagers' homes, putting civilians at risk. International forces accuse the insurgents of using women and children as human shields. The convoy hit by the roadside bomb was returning from a mission to conduct poppy eradication in Maiwand district, Khalid said. Two suspects were arrested, said Mohammad Nabi, a police official. Southern Afghanistan, the world's largest opium producing region, has been at the front line of battles between insurgents and foreign forces in recent years. |
| Posted by:Fred |