NATO on Sunday announced the death of two foreign soldiers, one of them American, in Afghanistan's insurgent heartland as the Taliban was blamed for attacks that wounded civilians across the country.
One soldier whose nationality was not given, died Sunday in an insurgent attack, NATO's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said in a statement.
Another, confirmed as an American, died Saturday following a Taliban-style bomb attack, ISAF said.
The deaths brings to 497 the total number of foreign troops to die in the Afghan war so far this year, according to an AFP tally based on one kept by the icasualties.org website. The total in 2009 was 521.
The war is nearing the end of its ninth year, with international troops at almost full strength of 150,000, from the United States and NATO.
The deployments include 30,000 US troops ordered up by US President Barack Obama last December as part of a new counter-insurgency strategy aimed at speeding an end to the war.
Most of the new arrivals are heading to Kandahar and Helmand provinces, where the insurgency is concentrated and the fighting is the hardest.
The Taliban have relied on makeshift bombs, called improvised explosive devices (IEDs), which they have been able to evolve as the international forces use heavier armour and specially-equipped vehicles.
The IEDs are responsible for the majority of deaths among the international troops, as they are difficult to detect and are detonated by remote control or by pressure when vehicles pass over or soldiers step on them during patrols.
The Taliban also use suicide bomb attacks and targeted assassinations to great effect, and have recently been aiming at candidates in the upcoming parliamentary elections and their supporters in an attempt to disrupt the September 18 poll.
President Hamid Karzai on Saturday announced the establishment of a High Peace Council to pursue a dialogue with the Taliban leadership with the aim of ending the long war.
Commanders and politicians have said that the war cannot be won through military means alone, and the council has been welcomed as a major step forward on the road to peace.
Violence on Saturday and Sunday caused widespread injury across the country, according to officials.
Kandahar city was struck around midday Sunday by a Taliban-style attack apparently targeting a police vehicles, Kandahar provincial police chief General Sardar Mohammd Zazai said.
"An IED explosion targeting a police vehicle inside Kandahar city at around 12:30 today injured four policemen," he said.
In another attack in the Dand district of Kandahar, another police officer was killed while visiting his family, the provincial authorities said, blaming insurgents.
In central Ghazni province, 45 people were injured when a bomb exploded in a market on Saturday night.
Officials in Ghazni city, the capital of Ghazni province, said people were praying in a nearby mosque when the powerful explosion took place.
Provincial police chief Delawar Zahid said the market was destroyed, and the mosque and a nearby hotel were badly damaged.
"The bomb planted and detonated by the enemies of peace and stability next to a mosque at around 9:00 pm (0430 GMT) Saturday night, injuring 45 civilians who were paraying at the mosque," he said.
"Security forces have launched an investigation, and found traces of ammonium nitrate fertilizer in the area," the provincial governor, Mosa Khan, said.
Ammonium nitrate, which military officials say is trucked over the border into Afghanistan from neighbouring Pakistan, is a major ingredient in Taliban bombs.
Copyright 2010 AFP South Asian Edition
