Sunday, August 02, 2009 KABUL: Following the bloodiest month for foreign troops stationed in Afghanistan, foreign officials announce the death of four more US-led soldiers in the war-ravaged country. Senior US military officials in Kabul confirmed that three American troops were killed on Saturday when a roadside explosion ripped through an army convoy in the troubled southern Kandahar Province. More than two hundred foreign soldiers have been killed in Afghanistan this year. A Saturday statement by the French military confirms that a French soldier was also killed in deadly clashes with Taliban militants north of Kabul. Two other soldiers were wounded in the clashes. Deaths among US-led NATO troops have also soared this year, particularly in the insurgency-hit southern and eastern provinces where deadly fighting is ongoing. Seventy-four foreign troops -- including 43 Americans -- have so far been killed in militant attacks across Afghanistan during the five past weeks. July was the deadliest month for international forces since the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001.
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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