Bomb attack kills US soldiers, Afghan civilians

: officials
Updated at: 1220 PST, Tuesday, May 26, 2009
KABUL: A bomb attack on US troops north of Kabul Tuesday killed an unknown number of US soldiers and three Afghan civilians, military and Afghan officials told.


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Afghanistan suicide attack kills 3 foreign soldiers
26 May 2009 07:34:01 GMT
Source: Reuters
(Adds details, incidents in Ghazni and Uruzgan provinces)

KABUL, May 26 (Reuters) - Three soldiers fighting with NATO-led forces and a civilian were killed by a suicide car bomb attack on a military convoy in east Afghanistan on Tuesday, Afghan officials and a spokesman for the alliance said.

One foreign soldier and one civilian were also injured when a suicide bomber rammed an explosive-laden car into the convoy in the northern Sayat district of Kapisa province, said Abdul Ali Mayar, a spokesman for the provincial governor.

Mayar also said a U.S. military vehicle was destroyed in the attack. U.S. forces declined to comment on the incident.

NATO-led forces said the nationality of the soldiers had not yet been released. Mainly U.S. and French troops working under NATO command are deployed in Kapisa province.

Violence in Afghanistan is expected to spike in the coming months as some 21,000 additional U.S. forces are deployed to reinforce NATO-led troops in the south and east of the country, the frontline of the fight against Taliban-led insurgents.

Despite the increasing numbers of foreign troops, violence has risen to its highest levels in recent months since the Taliban were ousted after a U.S.-led invasion in 2001.

Five Taliban were killed in an overnight air strike by foreign forces in Ghazni province, southwest of Kabul, the provincial police chief said.

And on Monday, Afghan police and U.S. forces killed eight militants in Uruzgan province in southern Afghanistan, U.S. forces said.

Another three insurgents were killed when a bomb they were planting exploded in southeastern Paktika province, the Afghan National Security Directorate said. (Reporting by Hamid Shalizi and Golnar Motevalli; Editing by Emma Graham-Harrison
and Paul Tait)

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Bomb targeting U.S. convoy in Iraq kills 3
26 May 2009 11:04:31 GMT
Source: Reuters
BAGHDAD, May 26 (Reuters) - A bomb struck a convoy of U.S. officials and civilian contractors visiting a construction site in western Iraq, killing three people and wounding two, the U.S. military said on Tuesday.

A U.S. military statement gave no further details of the attack, which occurred on Monday near the city of Falluja, 50 km (30 miles) west of Baghdad.

It said the names of the dead and wounded were being withheld pending efforts to contact their relatives -- something the United States usually does when its own citizens have been killed or wounded in Iraq.

Violence in predominantly Sunni Arab western Iraq has fallen dramatically since it was the hub of a raging insurgency in 2005 through 2007 but militant cells still operate in the desert region. (Writing by Tim Cocks; Editing by Angus MacSwan)