Afghan militants kill 9 US troops near Pak border

Kabul, Jul 14: In what is being described as the 'deadliest attack' on US forces deployed in Afghanistan in recent years, nine American troops were killed in an insurgent attack on a remote US military base near the Afghanistan-Pakistan border.

NATO's International Security Assistance Force said that militants fired machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and mortars from homes and a mosque in the village of Wanat in the Kunar province, a mountainous region that borders Pakistan. In a separate incident in the Helmand province, international and Afghan security forces killed at least 40 militants in an operation which was still on, said the US-led coalition on Sunday.

The fighting began on Saturday after militants ambushed a joint Afghan and international security patrol in the province's volatile Sangin district, said the coalition in a statement. "The ensuing fighting led Afghanistan National Security Forces (ANSF) and coalition forces to return fire and call for precision air-strikes. At least 40 militants have been killed in the last two days with over 30 enemy boats destroyed," the Daily Times quoted the statement as saying.

Besides, in another incident on Sunday, a suicide bomber blew himself up in a crowded bazaar in southern Afghanistan killing 24 people. Military officials said that the blast hit Uruzgan province during heavy fighting in northeastern Afghanistan between NATO-led Afghan soldiers and insurgents.

They said that the suicide bomber rammed his three-wheeled motorbike into a police vehicle in an Uruzgan bazaar, adding that the explosion ripped through several shops.

ANI