KABUL - A series of clashes in southern Afghanistan left 43 suspected Taliban militants dead, while a suicide bomber in the east wounded a NATO soldier, officials said Saturday. At least four police officers died in a separate clash.
Twenty-three Taliban militants were killed during a U.S.-led coalition operation aimed at disrupting a weapons transfer in southern Afghanistan, the coalition said Saturday.
A truck apparently full of Taliban weapons exploded during the operation in Helmand province's Garmsir district. The coalition said it didn't know what caused the truck to explode.
Coalition troops detained 11 people suspected of being part of a weapons running operation.
In Kandahar province, Canadian and Afghan troops battled militants and called in air strikes in Zhari district on Saturday, leaving at least 20 suspected militants dead, said provincial police chief, Sayed Agha Saqeb. An Afghan soldier was also killed, he said.
Meanwhile, a roadside bomb in the south killed two Canadians and their translator on Saturday, the alliance said in a statement. Three other Canadian soldiers were wounded in the blast that hit their vehicle, the statement said.
In the western province of Ghor, meanwhile, between four and nine police were killed Friday after militants attacked them during a police operation in Shahark district, Gen. Shah Jahon Noori, the provincial police chief, said Saturday.
Noori said an unknown number of police were missing after the attack and that five were wounded.
Separately, a suicide bomber on a motorbike attacked a NATO convoy in Nagarhar province's Chaparhar district on Saturday, wounding an alliance soldier and two civilians, officials said. The bomber was killed in the blast, said Noor Agha Zuwak, a spokesman for the provincial governor.
Afghanistan has seen record levels of violence this year. More than 5,800 people have been killed in insurgency related violence in 2007, according to an Associated Press count based on figures from Western and Afghan officials.
