Canadian soldiers killed in Afghanistan

KAFIR BAND, Afghanistan – Three suicide bombers killed at least 19 people across Afghanistan on Monday, including four Canadian soldiers in an attack that tested NATO’s claim of success in driving insurgents from this volatile southern region.

The deadliest attack was in the usually calm western city of Herat, where a militant strapped with explosives and riding a motorbike killed 11 people and wounded 18, including the deputy police chief, officials said.

The third attack, a car bombing in the capital, Kabul, killed at least four policemen and wounded one officer and 10 civilians.

Afghanistan has been suffering the heaviest insurgent attacks since the Taliban was toppled in late 2001, and the bombings came a day after NATO ended a two-week offensive against Taliban fighters in this region that the commander called a “significant success.”

“It does appear that they are resorting to these despicable tactics after the pressure we have them under in their strongholds,” a NATO spokesman, Maj. Luke Knittig, said in Kabul.

In Ottawa, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper praised the lost soldiers.

“It’s a tough mission, but the men and women of the Canadian Forces sign on for tough missions if they know they can do good in the world – that’s what they’re doing and … they have the absolutely unwavering support of their government,” he said.

NATO’s Operation Medusa centered on southern Kandahar province’s Panjwayi district, where the first of Monday’s suicide bombings killed four Canadian infantrymen delivering aid and wounded an unspecified number of other troops, the Canadian military said.

The bombing was claimed by a purported Taliban spokesman, Qari Yousaf Ahmadi, in a telephone call to an Associated Press reporter.

NATO said 25 civilians also were wounded in the blast in Kafir Band, a clutch of mud-brick homes surrounded by grape and pomegranate orchards.

The commander of NATO forces in Afghanistan, Lt. Gen. David Richards, said the attack took place as Canadian troops were arranging aid, reconstruction and development for villagers in the district, which suffered heavy damage during the NATO offensive.