KABUL, 13 August 2006 — Militants armed with rocket-propelled grenades attacked US troops patrolling in the remote northeast of Afghanistan, killing three soldiers before American forces repelled the assault with artillery fire, an official said yesterday.
Three soldiers and one civilian were also wounded in the battle in Waygal district of Nuristan province on Friday, said Col. Tom Collins, a US spokesman. They were later taken by helicopter to a military hospital for treatment. “We mourn their loss but their work continues,” Collins said, referring to the killed soldiers. “We will honor them by continuing our mission to pursue extremist wherever they are,” he added. He did not say whether the militants suffered any casualties.
In recent weeks US forces have been pushing to their northernmost points along the mountainous Afghan-Pakistan border, including Nuristan, opening military bases in one of the wildest regions in the country.
Their mission is to crush militants loyal to the Hezb-e-Islami group of renegade Afghan warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and the toppled Taleban regime and remnants of Osama Bin Laden’s Al-Qaeda network.
Separately, a highway police commander was killed by a blast on his way to work in eastern Lagman province, said Interior Ministry spokesman Yousef Stanezai.
