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Nato shells militants

Nato troops in eastern Afghanistan fired 20 artillery rounds at insurgents inside Pakistan after coordinating with Islamabad, officials said on Tuesday.

  • AP
  • Published: 23:40 November 18, 2008
  • Gulf News

Kabul: Nato troops in eastern Afghanistan fired 20 artillery rounds at insurgents inside Pakistan after coordinating with Islamabad, officials said on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, five Afghan troops were killed in a clash with insurgents in the west.

The military alliance said it fired the rounds on Sunday after insurgents attacked its troops in Afghanistan's eastern Paktika province with rockets from across the border.

"The artillery fire caused a secondary explosion at the rocket launch site, which indicates additional munitions in the location," the Nato statement said.

In an official statement on Tuesday, the Pakistani military said only that a Nato post was attacked by militants on Sunday and that Nato troops "engaged the fleeing militants on [the] Afghan side of the border and informed [a] Pakistani post on the Pak-Afghan border." Asked to confirm or deny if any activity occurred inside Pakistan, a military spokesmen refused to go beyond the issued statement.

Pakistani coordination with foreign troops in the region is a sensitive subject because of deep anti-American sentiment in Pakistan. However, officials say relations between Nato-led troops in Afghanistan and Pakistan's military are improving.


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