Two NATO soldiers killed in Afghanistan

Two NATO soldiers and an Afghan government official were killed in the separate attacks across the troubled country, authorities said Tuesday.

The latest deaths brought to 629 the number of foreign soldiers killed so far this year in the Afghan war, according to an AFP count.

NATO's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said one soldier was killed in an insurgent attack on Monday in the country's east, and another in the south by a bomb on Tuesday.

Their nationalities were not released and there were no further details.

AFP's tally is based on a count kept by the independent website icasualties.org, which also logs deaths of soldiers evacuated out of Afghanistan for treatment of injuries.

NATO and the United States have more than 150,000 troops deployed in the Afghanistan to fight the insurgency, led by Taliban militants who have stretched their presence to most parts of the country.

On Tuesday, a district governor was killed in another Taliban-style bomb explosion in eastern Paktia province, local authorities said.

Shwak district chief, Ali Abad, was on his way to work when his vehicle struck the device and was killed on the spot, provincial spokesman, Rohullah Samoon told AFP.

"The district chief was martyred in the blast," Samoon said.

Home-made bombs or improvised explosive devices are weapons of choice for the Taliban and other militants.

International and Afghan forces are currently engaged in a major offensive around Kandahar, the largest city in southern Afghanistan, aimed at pushing out the insurgents to bring an end to the long war.

NATO Soldier, 5 Cops Killed In Afghanistan

The NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in the Afghanistan has lost yet another soldier in an attack by suspected Taliban militants in the west of the country, local officials told media on Thursday.

An ISAF statement merely said that one of its troops had been killed in the insurgent attack. In keeping with the official policy, it did not identify the dead soldier or the site of the incident.

Elsewhere in the land-locked nation, four policemen died in an ambush by suspected insurgents in Ghoryan district in the western Afghan Herat province on Wednesday, the Interior Ministry said. They were killed when a roadside bomb struck their vehicle in Keshk-e-Kuhna district.

Another cop died in an ambush in Herat's Ghoryan district on Wednesday. Ensuing firefight also resulted in the death of a militant while three ultras were detained.

NATO soldiers were first deployed in Afghanistan in 2001 for counter-insurgency operations which led to the ouster of its Taliban-backed government.

According to the independent website iCasualties.org, which monitors military casualties in Afghanistan, over 590 U.S. and NATO-foreign troops have been killed there this year, making it the deadliest yet for the security alliance in the nearly-decade long war against the Taliban.