A NATO service member and translator were killed and seven troops were wounded when their convoy was ambushed in eastern Afghanistan, the alliance said yesterday.
The convoy was attacked on Saturday with small arms and rocket-propelled grenades, NATO's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said. An ISAF statement did not give any details about the location of the attack or the nationalities of the casualties.
Militant attacks and military operations have escalated this spring, mostly in the country's south and east.
In the country's most dangerous province, Helmand, a boat sank on Friday while crossing a river, leaving an estimated 60 people dead, including Taliban militants, the Defense Ministry said.
Hundreds of Taliban insurgents are believed to be in Helmand, the world's leading opium poppy region and the site of fierce battles in the last several months.
The Afghan army was investigating how many Taliban insurgents and how many civilians were on board, the Defense Ministry said. It did not say what caused the boat to sink.
Meanwhile, 34 suspected Taliban were killed in several gunbattles over two days in the southern province's Kajaki district, near where a US helicopter went down on Thursday, killing five Americans, a Canadian and a Briton.
The Interior Ministry said four Taliban group commanders were among the 34 killed. The Defense Ministry said two Afghan soldiers were killed and two wounded in the operations.
More than 1,900 people have been killed in insurgency-related violence in Afghanistan this year, according to an Associated Press count based on US, NATO and Afghan officials.
In related news, the Taliban threatened yesterday to behead an Afghan doctor and three nurses captured two months ago unless the government hands over the body of slain top commander Mullah Dadullah.
Dadullah was killed three weeks ago in the armed forces' biggest success against the extremist Taliban that launched an insurgency after being driven from government in 2001.
His position at the head of fighters in southern Afghanistan was taken by one of his brothers, Mansoor Dadullah, who issued the latest ultimatum through a spokesman.
"If the government does not give us Dadullah's body in three days, we will behead them," spokesman Shohabudin Atal said.
The ultimatum ended at 10am tomorrow, said Atal, who has often spoken to various media on behalf of both the Dadullah brothers.
The government of Kandahar Province showed Dadullah's body to the media before burying it at an undisclosed location. Governor Assadullah Khalid has said the body would be handed to the militant's family if they asked for it.
The extremist movement has vowed to avenge the commander's killing with a wave of violence.
It claimed to have kidnapped the all-male team of a doctor, three nurses and a driver in the southern province of Kandahar in late March.
A Taliban commander said at the time the movement wanted some of its prisoners freed from government jails in exchange for their release.
Kabul had days earlier freed five Taliban in exchange for an Italian journalist, whose Afghan driver and interpreter were beheaded.
Afghan media this week cited a senior intelligence official telling parliament that the militant group was also handed US$2 million to free the Italian.
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