UK to hand over control of violent Afghan area to US

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LONDON, July 7 (AFP): Britain was to announce Wednesday that its troops will withdraw from an area of southern Afghanistan where they have suffered heavy losses and hand control to the United States.
British Defence Secretary Liam Fox was expected to announce that British forces will pull out of Sangin district in the north of Helmand province by the end of year, reports said.
US forces, who now outnumber British troops in Helmand, will then take charge.
Sangin, a market town, has witnessed some of the fiercest fighting the British military has faced since World War II.
Of 312 British service personnel to have died in Afghanistan since operations began there in 2001, 99 were killed in Sangin and surrounding areas.
The area is particularly dangerous because it contains a patchwork of rival tribes and is a major centre for Afghanistan's opium-growing trade.
Fox was expected to announce in parliament that British forces will refocus their efforts on Helmand's central belt, leaving the north and south to the United States, according to reports.
It is understood the withdrawal of the approximately 1,000 British troops in Sangin will not begin for several months.
The decision followed Britain handing over command in Helmand to a US general last month.
It also came as US President Barack Obama's troop surge pumps greater numbers of US forces into Helmand -- there are now some 20,000 American marines in the province.
Meanwhile, BBC adds: Five Afghan soldiers have accidentally been killed in a NATO airstrike, officials in Afghanistan have said.
A spokesman for the Afghan defence ministry condemned the incident, saying it was not the first time Afghan soldiers had died in 'friendly fire'.
Gen Mohammad Zahir said the soldiers had been launching an attack against insurgents in Ghazni province in eastern Afghanistan.