KABUL, 19 April 2008 — The son of the Netherlands’ new military chief was one of two Dutch soldiers killed by a bomb in southern Afghanistan yesterday.
Taleban claimed responsibility for the roadside attack that killed Lt. Dennis van Uhm, the son of Gen. Peter van Uhm, and said the attack was in retaliation for an anti-Islam film by a Dutch MP.
Gen. van Uhm was named top commander of the Dutch armed forces only on Thursday.
Four Dutch soldiers were returning from a reconnaissance mission when the blast hit their vehicle in the southern province of Uruzgan, Dutch Defense Ministry spokesman Gen. Freek Meulman said.
The two Dutch soldiers were aged 23 and 22, said Meulman. Two other soldiers aged 20 and 25 were wounded in the attack; one is in critical condition and the other stable.
“We knew that the son of Dutch chief of staff was in the vehicle,” Taleban spokesman Yousuf Ahmadi told AFP.
The hard-line militia had earlier threatened to step up attacks against Dutch forces in Afghanistan if far-right Dutch lawmaker Geert Wilders broadcast his anti-Islam film. It was aired last month.
“This attack was part of our operation against the Dutch. First it was because they have occupied our country and secondly it was in retaliation for the Dutch insult to Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him),” Ahmadi said.
Ahmadi’s claim could not be independently confirmed.
Uruzgan police chief Juma Gul Hemat said the incident occurred near Tirin Kot, the provincial capital. “It was a roadside bomb blast which hit the Dutch soldiers,” he said.
More than 1,600 Dutch soldiers are deployed in Afghanistan as part of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) which is fighting a raging insurgency.
The Dutch government decided in November to extend the mission until late 2010. Sixteen Dutch soldiers have been killed in the country, either in accidents or combat.
The latest casualties brought to 44 the number of foreign soldiers killed in Afghanistan this year. The violence took the lives of nearly 220 foreign soldiers last year.
Three Afghan civilians died in another roadside bomb blast near the capital Kabul yesterday, police said.
The men were killed when their vehicle hit a bomb planted on a road frequently used by Afghan and international forces in Logar province, provincial police chief Ghulam Mustafa said. He blamed the attack on Taleban-linked insurgents.
The attacks followed a suicide bomb blast in the southwestern province of Nimroz on Thursday evening that killed 25 people including two senior police officials. Ahmadi, the Taleban spokesman, said the group could not immediately claim responsibility for the Nimroz attack.
The Taleban were ousted from power in 2001 in a US-led invasion.
