AFGHANISTAN:Three British soldiers were killed in a suicide attack in southern Afghanistan yesterday, taking the number of British military personnel killed in the country since 2001 to 100.
The men, from 2nd Battalion, the Parachute Regiment, were on a routine footpatrol near their base in the Upper Sangin Valley in Helmand province when they were struck by an explosion.
Four soldiers were injured in the attack and evacuated to Camp Bastion for treatment.
Earlier, an Afghan reporter working for BBC radio was killed in Helmand.
Abdol Samad Rohani reported on a drug-burning ceremony at the airport in Lashkar Gah, Helmand's provincial capital, on Saturday morning, then after lunch left home without saying where he was going.
His body was found yesterday.
Local officials said he had been abducted and killed.
Helmand, one of the most violent of the Afghan provinces, produces nearly half the world's opium, which is refined to make heroin.
Afghan security forces backed by mainly British troops hold a string of towns along the Helmand river that feeds a fertile strip cutting through the desert.
Taliban insurgents are still active in the area, but a spokesman denied any involvement in the killing.
- (PA, Reuters)