Taliban kill 5, S afghan

Taliban kill 5 Western soldiers in Afghanistan

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A NATO soldier climbs over a mud wall during a firefight with Taliban insurgents in southeastern Afghanistan, July 3, 2007. Five Western soldiers, including three Americans, were killed in a string of Taliban attacks in eastern and southern Afghanistan, officials said on Monday. Finbarr O'Reilly Reuters

Published: Monday, August 27, 2007

KABUL -- Five Western soldiers, including three Americans, were killed in a string of Taliban attacks in eastern and southern Afghanistan, officials said on Monday.

The Americans were killed along with two Afghan soldiers in a Taliban ambush on Monday in Ghazi Abad district of eastern Kunar province, near the border with Pakistan, the district police chief told reporters.

NATO officials in Kabul said earlier that two soldiers had been killed while on patrol Sunday, one in an attack in eastern Afghanistan and the other in the south.

NATO did not identify the victims.

However, the Netherlands' military said a Dutch soldier had been killed overnight by a bomb in southern Afghanistan.

It said the 30-year-old sergeant was in a unit searching for explosives in the province of Uruzgan when an improvised device exploded, Chief of Staff Dick Berlijn told a televised news conference. A 23-year-old corporal was wounded, Berlijn said.

The Netherlands has about 1,700 troops in Afghanistan.

Violence has surged in the past 19 months in Afghanistan where more than 100 Western troops under the command of NATO and the U.S. military have been killed this year while fighting a renewed Taliban-led insurgency.,

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This is 400 or 500 miles from Tora Bora, and appears to be an attempt to draw resources off the pressure in Malawa valley region.

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