U.S. Forces Say They Killed 20 Militants

The U.S. military said its forces had killed more than 20 Islamic militants Tuesday in eastern Afghanistan but denied reports that it had killed up to eight villagers in the same operation.

Local police and aid workers said earlier that U.S. bombing killed six to eight villagers, wounded nine and destroyed several houses in Weradesh.

But spokesman Maj. Scott Nelson in Kabul said, “We didn’t fire on these people.”

The U.S.-led forces had “eyes on the ground” that saw their “precision-guided bomb” strike its target, a militant’s vehicle with a weapons system mounted on it, probably a mortar, he said. Forces belonging to the Taliban and their ally, renegade commander Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, are active in the area, about 125 miles east of Kabul, near the Pakistani border.

But Kunar’s deputy police chief, Mohammed Arif Nizami, said in Asadabad, the provincial capital, “As a result of the bombing by American planes, six civilians have lost their lives, nine more have been injured and eight houses have been demolished.”

An Afghan who worked in the village for a Western aid agency was also reported wounded.

“According to the information from our local staff, eight villagers were killed in the bombing. One of our Afghan staff was wounded too,” said Gorm Pederson, who works with a Danish aid agency.

Nelson said any casualties among the villagers were more likely caused by militants’ inaccurate rocket and mortar fire.

U.S.-led forces along with Afghan troops engaged the militants after one of their installations came under attack.

Nelson said ground forces cornered a militant who blew himself up with a grenade, wounding seven children.