Nearly 100 dead in Afghanistan violence

 

KANDAHAR: Taliban militants fought fierce battles with coalition and Afghan forces in a dramatic upsurge of violence in southern Afghanistan, leaving up to 100 people -- mostly rebels -- dead, officials said Thursday.          

 

Two suicide bombs also rocked the insurgency-hit country. One in western Afghanistan killed a US anti-narcotics adviser while a civilian died in the other in the south.            

 

The battles, in which 13 police and a Canadian soldier also died, were all in the volatile south and came weeks before NATO-led peacekeepers are due to take over operations in the troubled region at the end of July.          

 

It was the worst violence for months in Afghanistan, where remnants of the ultra-Islamic Taliban continue to wage a bloody insurgency more than four years after their hardline regime was ousted by US-led forces.     

 

In an operation early on Thursday in southern Kandahar province seven Taliban were confirmed killed with another 15 to 20 likely dead in an air strike, the US-led coalition said.

 

A coalition soldier was also wounded. Three suspected Taliban hideouts were destroyed in the operation, designed to "detain individuals suspected of terrorist and anti-Afghanistan activities," it said in a statement.        

 

Separately a battle raged in Helmand province for several hours late on Wednesday after police stormed a district on a tip-off that Taliban fighters had massed there, interior ministry spokesman Yousuf Stanizai said.     

 

Thirteen police were killed, seven were wounded and two are missing after the hours-long fighting in Musa Qala district, Stanizai said.         

 

"Around 40 Taliban were killed and they have left behind the bodies of 10," he said. The militants often take the bodies of their dead away with them.             Ten Taliban were captured, he said.   

 

"The attack was very strong," said Moheedin Khan, a spokesman for the Helmand governor. "But we resisted."   

 

Britain will have stationed some 3,000 troops by July in Helmand to help maintain security.             Afghan security forces backed by Canadian troops and artillery and British helicopters fought Taliban insurgents for most of the day Wednesday in neighbouring Kandahar province.           

 

 "Eighteen Taliban have been killed and 35 are detained" in the fighting centering on Panjwayi district 24 kilometres (15 miles) west of Kandahar city, coalition spokesman Major Quentin Innis said on Thursday.   

 

A Canadian soldier was killed when her unit came under fire from small arms and rocket-propelled grenades. She became the first Canadian woman to die in combat since World War II.         

 

Kandahar is the birthplace of the Taliban movement that rose to control most of war-weary Afghanistan by 1996. It was toppled by a US-led coalition in late 2001 when it refused to hand over Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.       

 

A US anti-narcotics adviser was killed in the western city of Herat on Thursday when a suicide bomber rammed an explosives-packed car into his Land Cruiser, the US embassy said. An Afghan interpreter was wounded.       

 

A second suicide bomber struck hours later in the southern city of Ghazni, killing an Afghan passer-by. The attacker tried to slam his car into an Afghan army convoy but the bombs exploded before he could reach the troops.           

 

The Taliban claimed responsibility for both bombings.  Taliban insurgents have intensified their attacks in recent months, including suicide bombings that were almost unheard of in Afghanistan before September last year.      

 

There have been 22 suicide attacks in the country this year, most of them in the south. The blasts have killed 49 people, including two foreigners.