Kabul: The NATO-led force in Afghanistan said that one of its soldiers was killed in action today in the south of the country, where new Taliban attacks also killed three policemen and an Afghan cleric.

The International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) helping Afghanistan to fight a fierce Taliban-led uprising did not give the name and nationality of its latest fatality, the fourth this year.

"An ISAF serviceman was killed today in a hostile incident in southern Afghanistan," it said in a statement that contained no other details.

There are more than 50,000 troops in ISAF, most of them Americans although many of those in the south are British, Canadian and Dutch.

Two British soldiers and an Australian have already been killed in Afghanistan this year, which military forces say is likely to see as much Taliban-linked violence as 2008, the bloodiest yet of the insurgency.

The Taliban regime was toppled in a US-led invasion in late 2001. The hardliners however regrouped and are trying to regain power through a campaign of violence, with most attacks occurring in southern and eastern Afghanistan.

Taliban militants raided a police post outside the southern city of Kandahar early yesterday and killed three officers, regional police commander Ghulam Ali Wahdat told AFP.

Three others were missing after the attack and one wounded, he said.

Men on motorbikes yesterday shot dead a pro-government mullah, or religious leader, as he was praying in a Kandahar mosque, provincial government spokesman Zalmai Ayoubi said.
Source : PTI