US air raid kills 3 Afghan police officers in Helmand
At least three Afghan border police officers have been killed in the latest of US airstrikes in Afghanistan's Helmand province.
According to a statement by the US military command in Kabul on Saturday, the so-called friendly fire occurred on Friday night, when an American military aircraft opened fire on Afghan forces' positions in Nad Ali district of the restive southern province.
It added that the overnight raid killed "members" of the Afghan Border Police (ABP) but did not specify an exact death toll.
"We would like to express our deepest condolences to the families of the ABP members affected by this unfortunate incident," the statement further read, adding that an investigation was being undertaken to determine the specific circumstances that led to the incident.
Meanwhile, Omar Zwak, a spokesman for the Helmand governor, said the aggression had claimed the lives of at least three police officers and inflicted injuries on two others.
However, an Afghan TV network, TOLO News, citing unnamed sources from the province, said the real death toll and the number of the injured were much higher than what the governor's office had announced.
Every so often, US air raids kill both Afghan soldiers and civilians across the country. Last August, a US drone attack killed 22 Afghan soldiers in Helmand, and in September that year airstrikes conducted by American warplanes claimed the lives of at least eight Afghan troops in the central province of Uruzgan. Back in February, US airstrikes also killed 22 civilians in Helmand.
Read more:
- 'US drone attack kills 22 Afghan soldiers'
- US airstrikes kill 8 Afghan policemen
- 'US strikes killed 22 civilians in Afghanistan'
Airstrikes by US warplanes have also significantly increased in recent months against the purported positions of the Taliban militant group and other terror outfits in the crisis-hit country. US President Donald Trump is also considering requests from military commanders for thousands more international troops.
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Last month, American officials said the US military needed between 3,000 and 5,000 additional troops, including hundreds of Special Operations forces, in Afghanistan.
The United States currently has about 8,400 soldiers in Afghanistan with another 5,000 troops from NATO allies.
Despite the presence of thousands of foreign boots on the ground, Afghanistan has been rocked by an increase in terrorist attacks, some of them carried out by the Daesh Takfiri terrorist group mainly active in Nangarhar province.
The country has already been torn apart by decades of Taliban-led militancy and the 2001 invasion by the US and its allies.
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