Afghanak Home of the afghans افغانک خانه افغانها

KANDAHAR: Twenty-two Afghans, most of them militants, were killed and six US soldiers injured in the latest attacks linked to the country�s former Taliban regime, officials said o­n Monday.

Militants from the Taliban attacked a district in Helmand province early Monday, a provincial government spokesman said. "Taliban attacked Washer district at 2:30 am and killed the district governor Mullah Sakhi and o­ne policeman," Mohammad Wali told AFP.

"Eleven Taliban were killed in the exchange of fire and their bodies are still lying in the area. Three Taliban were wounded," he said. Late o­n Sunday at least o­ne policeman was killed and two were wounded when a checkpoint o­n the highway between Kabul and the main southern city of Kandahar was attacked in Zabul province. Zabul police director Abdul Jabar Uruzgani said Taliban fighters had carried out the attack.

Uruzgani said seven Taliban fighters were also killed but their bodies were not left at the scene. The Taliban often take the bodies of fallen comrades with them. A highway policeman was killed in an attack o­n the Kandahar-Herat road in the western province of Farah early Sunday and four others were wounded, three critically, said Herat police spokesman Abdul Raof Ahmadi.

Three US soldiers and an Afghan National Army soldier were wounded o­n Sunday by two separate improvised bombs in southeastern Khost province, the US military said. All four have since returned to duty.

On the same day three US troops were slightly wounded when their vehicle hit an improvised bomb during a patrol in the troubled province of Paktika. Meanwhile, the Taliban said o­n Monday they had released the remaining 23 people from a group they captured last week, after executing eight of the hostages.