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Twenty rebels killed in Afghan ambush

US soldiers from the 2nd Battalion, 87th Infantry Regiment, 10th Mountain Division who had been in a joking mood listen to Captain Jared Wilson talk about the gravity of their mission on June 15. The soldiers were on a mission in support of Operation Mountain Thrust, an offensive to root out Taliban militants in southern Afghanistan. PHOTO: AP

Twenty insurgents were killed in southern Afghanistan after they ambushed US-led forces, the latest battle in the bloodiest phase of violence since the Taliban were ousted in 2001.

Two coalition personnel were wounded in the clash in the Sangin district of Helmand Province on Sunday, the force said in a statement. Two British soldiers were killed in an attack in the same district on Saturday.

"The patrol had just completed a cordon-and-search operation, where they recovered an enemy weapons cache, when up to 30 extremists attacked," the force said in a statement.

The foreign force has in recent weeks launched a major offensive in the south before a separate NATO-led peacekeeping force takes over command there at the end of the month in what looks set to be the alliance's toughest-ever ground mission.

In a separate incident yesterday, a timebomb exploded in a classroom of female university students in the western city of Herat, killing one woman and wounding eight others, police said.

The device blew up just after 9am in the English-language section of the Herat University's education faculty, the city's police director Ghulam Sarwar Haidari said.

"The explosion took place at a time when the class was out but still there were a number of girls inside the class," Haidari said.

The blast destroyed chairs and tables, and shattered the windows. Blood was smeared across the floor.

The bomb had been hidden in a rubbish bin, said the interior ministry in Kabul, which handles police matters.

"One student named Razia died of her serious wounds in the hospital. Eight others were also slightly wounded by pieces of glass and the explosion. Some have already been discharged from hospital," a ministry spokesman said.

It was not immediately clear who had planted the bomb but one of the students said the attack was carried out by "enemies of knowledge and education".

"They want to scare us not to study, but we are not afraid of such incidents and will continue to come to the institute and continue our education," said Frozan Ahmadi.

The extremist Taliban movement that was removed from government in late 2001 by a US-led coalition barred women and girls from getting an education or working.

Since the regime fell, women and girls have flooded back to schools although they are still outnumbered by men and boys.

In a separate incident, a suspected Taliban bomber was killed when a thermos flask packed with explosives went off in Khost town, in eastern Afghanistan, yesterday. A boy was wounded, a provincial official said.

Meanwhile, an Apache attack helicopter from the US-led force crashed on Sunday evening while hunting insurgents, who fired rockets into the main foreign military base in the south of the country.

One crewman was killed and one injured in the crash, shortly after the aircraft took off from the base outside Kandahar.
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