3 US-led troops killed in Afghanistan

Three US-led soldiers have been killed in separate attacks in the restive southern Afghanistan amid an increase in the number of such incidents in the war-battered country.

A soldier with the US-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) was killed on Thursday in an explosion caused by an improvised explosive device in Afghanistan southern province of Kandahar.

Another ISAF soldier died when a roadside bomb targeted the vehicle he was aboard, the alliance said in a separate statement. The third lost his life in a fierce firefight with militants.

The latest deaths bring to 62 the number of fatalities among foreign troopers in war-ravaged Afghanistan this month. June, nonetheless, remains the worst month for foreign military casualties with a death toll of 103. A total of 552 foreign soldiers have been killed in the Afghan war so far this year.

The US Army has lost 1, 307 soldiers since October 2001 when Washington unleashed the US-led invasion of Afghanistan. Thousands of civilians have died and many others sustained injuries in US-led operations in Afghanistan.

Earlier on Thursday, a Press TV correspondent reported that seven ISAF servicemen had lost their lives in a militant attack.