KHOST, (Afghanistan), June 25 (Reuters): US-led coalition and Afghan forces killed up to 35 Taliban insurgents after the militants attacked two towns in eastern Afghanistan near the Pakistan border overnight, a police chief said Wednesday.
The Taliban have launched a number of ground assaults and rocket attacks on isolated towns in eastern Afghanistan in the last week, part of a rising wave of violence in the east that Afghan and US officials have said is the result of de-facto ceasefires with militants in neighboring Pakistan.
About 100 Taliban insurgents attacked the towns of Gomal and Sarobi in Paktika province overnight, but fled when they were engaged by Afghan police supported by coalition troops, said provincial Police Chief Nabi Jan Mullah Khail. Coalition air strikes then killed 35 insurgents who were hiding after the attacks, he said.
But the US military said "approximately 22" militants were killed by coalition air support after the attacks. "When coalition air support arrived, the 22 militants who attacked the district centers were positively identified and killed," the statement added.
The Afghan government and some of its Western allies are growing increasingly frustrated by Pakistan's failure to clamp down on militant activity in its tribally ruled border regions.
The new Pakistani government has halted military offensives against pro-Taliban groups on its side of the border and has attempted to seal peace deals with the militants to try to stem violence which has killed hundreds in Pakistan in the last year.
But Afghan and Western officials have said the peace talks free up the militants to mount more attacks in Afghanistan.
The US commander of NATO forces in eastern Afghanistan said on Tuesday insurgent attacks in the region had risen by 40 percent in the first five months of this year compared to last.
A spokesman for Afghan President Hamid Karzai said on Tuesday Pakistan must stop the militants launching cross-border raids or Afghanistan would take action. Karzai threatened this month to send Afghan troops into Pakistan to hunt down the militants.
Pakistan strongly objected to Karzai's threat and said only its troops were permitted to carry out operations on its soil.
Elsewhere in Afghanistan, US-led coalition forces killed several militants and detained another 12 in the southern Afghan province of Helmand on Tuesday, the US military said.
