Few civilian deaths from Afghan bombing-officials

KABUL, Aug 4 (Reuters) Afghan and Western military forces said today there were minimal civilian casualties from an air strike in southern Afghanistan this week that targeted Taliban leaders and may have killed up to 150 people.

Aircraft from the US-led coalition in Afghanistan launched a strike in the Baghran area of Helmand province on Thursday, targeting known Taliban commanders, the US military said.

The following day, Afghan authorities said they were checking reports of civilian casualties in the raid and said some 20 wounded had been brought to the main hospital in Lashkar Gah, the provincial capital.

British forces said 17 adult males and an eight-year-old boy were in hospital in Lashkar Gah suffering from blast injuries. The Afghan Defence Ministry said some 40 men had also been brought to hospital in the main southern city of Kandahar.

''It is interesting there were no females,'' said British Lieutenant-Colonel Charlie Mayo, suggesting the wounded adult males may have been Taliban fighters. ''We are very confident we hit a large meeting of Taliban and they are very sore about it.'' ''We were closely monitoring the Baghran district from Aug 2 in the morning,'' said Afghan Defence Ministry spokesman General Zahir Azimy.

He said there was a large group of armed men gathered to watch the execution of six Afghans accused of cooperating with the government.

SUICIDE BOMB Some six senior Taliban commanders were present, including Mansoor Dadullah, brother of Mullah Dadullah, the fierce Taliban commander for southern Afghanistan who was killed in a raid by British special forces in May.

Some of the commanders and a number of foreign Taliban fighters had been killed in the air strike, Azimy said, but it was not yet clear if Dadullah was among them.

''According to our sources, there were 150 people killed, maybe less, but not more,'' he told a news conference. ''If there were civilian casualties, they were very limited and should not exceed 10.'' NATO and US-led coalition troops target Taliban leaders in the hope of splitting them from rank-and-file fighters.

Already facing criticism over perceived lack of development, corruption and crime, growing insecurity and a booming drugs trade, President Hamid Karzai has warned that civilian deaths could have dire consequences for his government and the foreign troops.

Afghan and Western officials accuse the Taliban of deliberately courting civilian deaths by launching attacks from ordinary homes and carrying out indiscriminate bomb attacks.

A suicide car bomb targeting foreign forces killed two Afghan civilians in the city of Kandahar today, witnesses and Afghan troops said.

Canadian troops are the biggest contingent of foreign soldiers from the 37-nation NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Kandahar.

Two apparently wounded foreign soldiers were taken away from the scene, Afghan troops said.

REUTERS PY KN1656