KABUL: U.S. forces say international and Afghan troops have killed 11 militants in a firefight in southern Afghanistan.A military statement says the fighting broke out during a Thursday night raid on a key Taliban insurgent in Helmand province. The statement says the forces came under fire from militants inside the targeted compound and returned fire. The statement says one insurgent was captured and 11 were killed. No civilian casualties were reported.The U.S. is sending 17,000 additional troops to southern Afghanistan to stamp out the resurgent Taliban who have de facto control of the region. Senior U.S. officials say President BarackObama plans to deploy 4,000 trainers to build up Afghan forces as part of a new strategy to be announced Friday.
BAGHDAD: Nearly 500 U.S. Army combat engineers who specialize in clearing roads of explosives started shifting to southern Afghanistan."We are probably going to be the beginning of the influx you are going to see to Afghanistan," Lt. Col. Kevin Landers, commander of the Fort Carson, Colo.-based 4th Engineer Battalion, said as crews packed crates and cleaned vehicles for the flight to Kandahar.Obama has ordered 17,000 more U.S. soldiers and Marines to Afghanistan to bolster the 38,000 American troops already battling the resurgent Taliban."We are going to take this footprint out of Iraq," said Landers, whose battalion received word of its reassignment last month just after taking command of clearing roads in Baghdad of bombs and debris.
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