30 August 2010 / AP, KABUL
Seven US troops have died in weekend attacks in Afghanistan’s embattled southern and eastern regions, while officials found the bodies on Sunday of five kidnapped campaign workers for a female candidate in the western province of Herat.
Two servicemen died in bombings Sunday in southern Afghanistan, while two others were killed in a bomb attack in the south on Saturday and three in fighting in the east the same day, NATO said. Their identities and other details were being withheld until relatives could be notified. The latest deaths bring to 42 the number of American forces who have died this month in Afghanistan after July’s high of 66. A total of 62 international forces have died in the country this month, including seven British troops. Fighting is intensifying with the addition of 30,000 US troops to bring the total number of international forces in Afghanistan to 120,000 -- 100,000 of them American. Most of those new troops have been assigned to the southern insurgent strongholds of Helmand and Kandahar provinces where major battles are fought almost daily as part of a gathering drive to push out the Taliban. The five campaign workers had been snatched on Wednesday by armed men who stopped their two-vehicle convoy as it was traveling through remote countryside.
