At least 18 Taliban militants and three policemen were killed in the latest fighting in insurgency-plagued Afghanistan, officials said yesterday.
Fourteen rebels were killed on Friday in a "clearance operation" in southern Helmand Province's Garmser district, which was briefly over run by Taliban militants early this month, the interior ministry said.
"During the operation 14 enemy were killed," spokesman Yousuf Stanizai said. Two other rebels were seized in Baba Jee district of the same province on Friday.
PHOTO: AP
Meanwhile, in the northeastern province of Kapisa, police killed four Taliban militants including a "famous commander" on Friday while also losing one of their own men, Stanizai said.
The fighting lasted for three hours, he said, without naming the rebel commander.
In the same province, Taliban insurgents attacked a highway police patrol, killing one policeman and injuring four others, he said. In a later hunt for the attackers, police captured two suspects.
Meanwhile, two law enforcement officers guarding an archeological site in northern Balkh province were killed and another was wounded when unknown assailants attacked them overnight, provincial police spokesman Sher Jan Durani said.
The men were part of a 50-man guard who were sent from Kabul in April to protect a historical site in Dawlatabad district of the province, the spokesman said.
Durani did not say who was believed to be behind the attack on police.
In related news, US-led coalition forces arrested four suspected al-Qaeda militants in eastern Afghanistan on Saturday, a coalition spokesman said.
The arrests were made during an operation in Sal Kalay, a village in Khost province.
"The mission was successful," spokesman Colonel Thomas Collins said in a statement, but did not give the name or nationality of the suspects.
"The purpose of the operation was to capture al-Qaeda operatives who have been involved in the planning of attacks against Afghan and coalition forces in eastern Afghanistan."
The Taliban militants and their al-Qaeda allies are mostly active in Afghanistan's eastern and southern regions where they enjoy considerable support from the local population.
The arrests came as NATO forces are preparing to take security responsibilities in the south next week -- the biggest mission of the alliance in its more than 50-year history.
The spokesman said two AK-47 assault rifles and a briefcase of extremist-related documents were confiscated from the location of the militants.
More than 1,700 people have been killed since January.
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