KABUL: Afghan villagers told a public health official Monday that a NATO air strike killed six civilians in a mountainous region of eastern Afghanistan, but the military alliance said four to eight militants were killed. Thirty others died in a spate of violence around the country. Four people were wounded in the air strike, including one woman, and had been taken to a hospital in Asadabad, the capital of Kunarprovince, said Asadullah Fazli, Kunar's chief of public health. Fazli said that villagers from Wata Pur district told him that six civilians died during the air strike, and that three houses were destroyed. NATO's International Security Assistance Force said that ``four to eight'' enemy fighters were killed and that intelligence intercepts indicated ``the hostile intent of the enemy to attack ISAF posts.'' Still, a spokesman said it was possible civilians were wounded.
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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