Nine NATO Soldiers Killed in Afghanistan

Source: Al-Manar TV, 16-03-2009

Nine international soldiers and three Afghan civilians were killed in a bloody weekend of attacks in Afghanistan, officials said.

The attacks came amid growing concern about violence in the war-torn country and across the border in Pakistan, more than seven years after the Taliban were removed from government in a US-led invasion.

The Taliban claimed responsibility for a blast that killed four International Security Assistance Force troopers in the eastern province of Nangarhar Sunday, on the border with Pakistan. "It was an IED (improvised-explosive device). Four soldiers were killed," an ISAF spokesman at the force's Kabul headquarters said.

A statement said that two were killed immediately and two died later from their wounds. The US military said the four were from the United States, which has about 38,000 soldiers in Afghanistan.

An Afghan media officer in the province said the bomb had been remotely detonated to hit a convoy in Bati Kot district. "These dedicated professionals have risked their lives for a safe and stable Afghanistan," ISAF spokesman Brigadier General Richard Blanchette said.

Two British soldiers from the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers were killed in an explosion while on vehicle patrol Sunday in the Garmsir district in southern Helmand province, the Ministry of War in London said. Three other ISAF soldiers died in Afghanistan on Saturday. One was French, another British and the nationality of the third has not been released.