Bodies of two SEALS found
KABUL, Afghanistan – Two Navy SEALS missing in Afghanistan have been found dead, a senior U.S. defense official said Monday night.
Another SEAL was rescued on Saturday, and the fate of a fourth SEAL was unknown. The official who confirmed the recovery of the two bodies spoke on condition of anonymity because of the ongoing effort to account for the missing U.S. servicemen in Afghanistan.
Meanwhile, an American airstrike in Afghanistan’s rugged eastern mountains killed 17 civilians, including women and children, an Afghan official said Monday. The U.S. military confirmed civilian deaths but said the numbers were unclear.
An initial airstrike destroyed a house, and as villagers gathered to look at the damage, a U.S. warplane dropped a second bomb on the same target, Kunar provincial Gov. Asadullah Wafa told the Associated Press.
The team of SEALS was reported missing last Tuesday in Kunar province. A rescue effort the same day ended in tragedy when the transport helicopter seeking to extract the team was shot down, killing 16 troops aboard.
The serviceman rescued on Saturday had taken shelter in an Afghan village elder’s home in the province before American forces were notified of his location and picked him up, Wafa said.
Earlier, Wafa said a second missing service member had been located in his province. His information came from Afghan intelligence sources, he said. But a senior Defense Department official in Washington said a second Navy SEAL had not been found.
A purported Taliban spokesman, Mullah Latif Hakimi, claimed last week that militants had captured one team member. He said the “high-ranking American” was caught in the area where the helicopter went down.
U.S. officials said they had no evidence indicating any service members had been taken into captivity.
The Navy SEAL rescued from Kunar province was being evaluated Monday, officials said. He was in stable condition and receiving medical treatment at the main U.S. base at Bagram.
The U.S. airstrike came Friday in the same province where the transport helicopter was downed.
The military said the attack was carried out “with precision-guided munitions that resulted in the deaths of an unknown number of enemy terrorists and noncombatants.”