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Afghan and NATO forces battled Taliban insurgents killing 71 militants
Afghan and NATO forces battled Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan's volatile south with rockets, artillery and airstrikes killing 71 militants Sunday in one of the country's bloodiest clashes in five years.
Five Afghan troops were also killed in the series of battles, which started late Saturday and spilled into Sunday morning after the Taliban attacked a police convoy in Panjwayi district of southern Kandahar province, said Niaz Mohammad Sarhadi, the district government chief.
Militants ambushed another police patrol in western Afghanistan's Farah province, sparking a gunbattle that left one officer and two attackers dead, a regional governor said.
Afghanistan's southern provinces are bearing the brunt of the worst bout of violence since U.S.-led forces toppled the hard-line Taliban regime in late 2001. Taliban holdouts and allied extremists have stepped up attacks in a bid to undermine the American-backed government of President Hamid Karzai.
Separately, three U.S. soldiers were killed and three others wounded during a fight with Taliban militants in Pech district in eastern Kunar province on Saturday, said Col. Tom Collins, the U.S. military spokesman.
Their combat patrol struck a homemade bomb before they engaged "a group of Taliban extremists," a U.S. military statement said.
Also Saturday, a U.S. soldier was killed and three others wounded in a four-hour clash with more than 100 insurgents in southern Uruzgan province, officials said. One Afghan soldier also died.
In Panjwayi, NATO troops used artillery and aircraft to inflict "heavy casualties against Taliban fighters," an alliance statement said.
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