US troops kill six Afghans in arrest attempt
( 2003-12-12 00:50) (Agencies)
Six Afghan fighters died in an exchange of fire at a maternity hospital as US
soldiers tried to arrest a local military commander in the Afghan city of
Jalalabad, witnesses said.
US soldiers blocked access to the hospital after
the clash, but people who said they saw the incident said four of Commander
Esmatullah's bodyguards were killed along with two soldiers from Jalalabad's
militia force.
A Reuters reporter later saw five bodies, three of them in
military uniforms and the other two in civilian clothes, on the floor of a
nearby hospital where another Afghan fighter was being treated for his
wounds.
Hospital doctors said the bodies were brought there from the
maternity hospital, but declined to say who they were or if they had died in the
fight with US soldiers.
Minutes after the clash, an explosion went off
outside the Indian consulate close by the maternity hospital, residents said,
adding there was no damage or any casualties.
Jalalabad police chief Haji
Ajab Shah said earlier there had been casualties among the Esmatullah's
bodyguards, but said he did not know if any US soldiers were wounded.
US
soldiers in Jalalabad refused to give details about the incident, and there was
no immediate comment from the US military headquarters at Bagram air base, north
of Kabul.
Shah said the clash happened when the US soldiers arrived at the
hospital in an attempt to arrest Esmatullah, who commands pro-government forces
in the neighbouring province of Laghman.
About 11,500 US-led forces are based
in Afghanistan, chasing remnants of the former Taliban regime overthrown from
power in 2001 for sheltering al Qaeda militants.
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