Officials: US-led coalition aircraft kill 15 militants in Afghanistan

By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
US-led coalition warplanes attacked militants withdrawing from a clash with police in the mountains of eastern Afghanistan on Tuesday, killing 15 of them, officials said. Ismatullah Alizai, police chief of Paktia province, said no one was hurt in the initial battle at the government headquarters in the town of Sayid Karam. 1st Lt. Nathan Perry, a spokesman for the US-led coalition, said an unmanned drone identified the retreating militants and that "close air support was used to engage and kill" them early Tuesday. Alizai said 15 militants were killed. He said all the bodies as well as four wounded fighters were at a local hospital. Fighting between Taliban-led insurgents and foreign and government forces is surging across the south and east of Afghanistan. Nearly 2,000 people have died in insurgency-related violence so far this year.