Thousands of Afghan, British, Canadian and US soldiers pushed on yesterday with a major operation against a Taliban hotbed in southern Afghanistan, the US-led coalition said.
The operation, which kicked off on Saturday in the Sangin district of Helmand Province, was the first time since the 1950s Korean War that the three foreign forces had worked together on such a large scale, a coalition spokesman said.
Thousands of troops were involved, US Major Scott Lundy said, although he was not authorized to give more precise figures.
The coalition said that 10 "extremists" were killed early on Saturday when the strike started in Sangin, where five British soldiers were killed in the past month.
The area, just 70km north of the provincial capital Lashkar Gah, has seen regular clashes with Taliban fighters who are said to have joined forces with drug barons in Helmand, the country's top opium-producing region.
A British base there has also been attacked several times, ranging from major assaults to minor potshots.
"We are going to continue until we are confident that the security situation has changed to the point when we can meet with the local population in a shura [council]," Lundy said.
The shura meeting is intended to find out the needs of the area in terms of rebuilding, a key part of a strategy to win back support in Afghanistan.
"The operation will reduce the extremists' ability to intimidate Afghan civilians and attack both the Afghan security forces and coalition forces in the Sangin district," the coalition said in a statement on Saturday.
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