Taliban claim killing 6 US soldiers

The Taliban militants say they have killed six US soldiers in separate bombing attacks in the eastern Afghanistan province of Khost.

Taliban Spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said the militants planted the roadside bomb that claimed two US soldiers in a passing military convoy in the province’s Gurbez district on Sunday.

Also on Sunday, four other GIs died when their vehicle went over an improvised explosive device in Khost’s provincial capital. The incident was similarly claimed by the militants.

The US-led International Security Assistance Force said earlier that another American soldier had died yesterday in another eastern province, Kunar, succumbing to injuries from a fight with the Taliban.

Brigadier-General Daniel Menard, the commander of the allied forces in Kandahar, also reported today the death of a Canadian soldier in an explosion in the southern province.

About 500 foreign forces died in the country last year.

Violence in Afghanistan has reached its highest levels in more than eight years of the US-led occupation despite the presence of more than 110,000 foreign forces there.