• At least 3 US soldiers killed by Afghanistan bomb

    By John Newland, Staff Writer, NBC News

    At least three U.S. soldiers died Tuesday in southern Kandahar province when their convoy struck a powerful improvised explosive device, officials said.

    The U.S.-led International Security Assistance Force said in a brief statement that three of its members had been killed when their convoy struck the IED in southern Afghanistan. It did not release their nationalities.

    Earlier, however, a NATO spokesman had said four U.S. service members had been killed and others were wounded, The Associated Press reported.

    Reuters also reported that four American service members had been killed, citing Kandahar provincial spokesman Jawid Ahmad Faisal.

    There was no immediate explanation for the differing number of deaths.

    The deaths came just a day after three Georgian solders with the ISAF were killed by an IED in Helmand province.

     

  • Seven US troops killed in separate Afghan attacks

    Mohammad Ismail / Reuters

    Afghan President Hamid Karzai says the CIA is going to continue funneling large amounts of cash to his government.

    By Kiko Itasaka, Jason White and Matthew DeLuca, NBC News

    Seven U.S. troops were killed Saturday in two separate incidents in Afghanistan – the second time in the past week that so many American lives were lost in a single day in the war-torn country.

    Five were killed in an attack involving an improvised explosive device in the southern part of Afghanistan, the International Security Assistance Force said in a statement. Kandahar governor's spokesperson Jawed Faizel said the device was a large roadside bomb.

    Two other U.S. troops died after an Afghan National Army soldier turned his weapon on them in what is commonly referred to as a “green on blue” attack, the ISAF said. In addition, the ISAF said another coalition service member died after an insurgent attack in northern Afghanistan, but the nationality was not released. 

    Nineteen American personnel have died over the past week, including a series of air crashes and the attacks on Saturday. Seven people died when a U.S. civilian cargo plane crashed and exploded shortly after takeoff from Bagram Airfield outside Kabul earlier in the week.

    The deaths came as Afghan President Hamid Karzai said at a news conference that the CIA would continue funneling large amounts of cash to his government.

    According to The Associated Press, Karzai said he told the CIA’s Kabul station chief: "'Because of all these rumors in the media, please do not cut all this money because we really need it. We want to continue this sort of assistance.' And he promised that they are not going to cut this money."

    "We have spent it in different areas (and) solved lots of our problems," Karzai reportedly said.

    The CIA payments were made in cash, Karzai said, adding that "all the money which we have spent, receipts have been sent back to the intelligence service of the United States monthly."

    NBC News’ Khyber Shinwari, Courtney Kube, Jim Miklaszewski and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

    MSNBC's Craig Melvin reports that five U.S. service members were killed by a roadside bomb in Afghanistan.

    Related:

    This story was originally published on Sat May 4, 2013 10:26 AM EDT

  • IED blast kills 16 Pakistani soldiers despite Taliban leader's directive

    By Mushtaq Yusufzai, NBC News

    PESHAWAR, Pakistan – An improvised explosive device detonated amid a Pakistani military convoy deployed to fight al-Qaida and militant groups Sunday in the volatile North Waziristan tribal region, leaving 16 army soldiers dead and 22 wounded, military officials said.


    The attack took place only a day after Pakistani Taliban leader Hakimullah Mahsud asked his fighters to refrain from attacking Pakistani security forces and government installations in North Waziristan and abide by a peace accord signed between the government and regional Taliban led by Hafiz Gul Bahadur.

    No militant group claimed responsibility for the deadliest attack on Pakistani security forces, though military authorities and government officials blamed anti-Pakistan militant organizations opposed to the restoration of peace in North Waziristan.

    Military officials said the local administration had banned civilian traffic from roads in all of North Waziristan on Sunday because of the movements of the security forces in the tribal region.

    The officials said unknown people planted the IED on the Miranshah-Razmak road which went off when the military convoy passed through the mountainous Narray Wala area.

    Government officials in the Razmak subdivision said two heavy military trucks were damaged in the blast. They said one of the trucks, which was carrying more than two dozen soldiers, plunged into a 1,000-foot-deep ravine after being hit by the IED.

    They said they believe most of the soldiers died when the truck fell into the ravine.

    Military officials said it took hours of frantic effort to recover the bodies and injured soldiers from the ravine before dark. Most of the injured were airlifted to military hospitals in Bannu and Peshawar.

    Military sources said they feared the death toll would rise because most of the injured were in critical condition.

    An official of the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) had the death toll at 14 soldiers and the number of wounded at 22. The discrepancy in the death toll was not explained.

    Government and military authorities said the attack came as a surprise after Mahsud asked his fighters to abide by the peace accord signed between the government and local Taliban in North Waziristan.

    Video: US drone strikes reportedly increase in Pakistan

    Government officials speculated that there might be elements within the Pakistani Taliban who did not want peace to prevail in North Waziristan or there could be a foreign presence trying to create mistrust between the tribespeople and armed forces.

    One of the officials in Miranshah said that military officials were encouraged enough by the peace initiative by the Taliban militants that they relaxed curfew for the local tribespeople three times on Sunday on the road where the attack took place so expectant mothers could be taken to hospital to give birth.

    "Nobody expected an attack on Pakistani forces," a government official said on condition of anonymity.

    The militants affiliated with Mahsud on Saturday issued a pamphlet in which the leader directed his men to abide by the peace agreement between local Taliban and the government for the maintenance of law and order in North Waziristan.

    Pakistani Taliban spokesman Ihsanullah Ihsan, calling from an undisclosed location, confirmed the Mahsud directive.

    "Oh, mujahedeen brothers! As you know that the Pakistani and Afghan Taliban under the leadership of Mullah Mohammad Omar Mujahid are engaged in jihad against the crusaders and infidels, and are supporters of each other in the ongoing holy war, the enemies do not want to see us united and disciplined against them and are being trying to divide us," Mahsud said in the pamphlet.

  • Eight dead from roadside bomb attack in Kabul

    Musadeq Sadeq / AP

    A damaged bus which was hit by a remote control bomb is lifted by a crane on the outskirts of Kabul, Afghanistan, on Aug. 7. A militant detonated a remote-control bomb Tuesday morning, killing at least eight Afghan civilians who were traveling in a bus just northwest of the Afghan capital, police said.

    S. Sabawoon / EPA

    Inside the wrecakge of a passanger van after it hit a roadside bomb blast in Paghman, district of Kabul, Afghanistan, on August 7. The bomb placed on a bridge in Paghman district of Kabul province targeted a civilian minibus in which eight people were killed and seven others were injured.

    From AP: KABUL, Afghanistan — A militant detonated a remote-control bomb Tuesday morning, killing at least eight Afghan civilians who were traveling in a bus just northwest of the Afghan capital, police said.

    The bomb was placed under a bridge and was detonated when the bus traveled over the span, said Mohammad Zahir, the criminal director for Kabul police. Continue reading this story here. 

      

  • Syrian rebel groups create formal alliance, but still depend on homemade weapons

    AFP - Getty Images

    A member of the Free Syrian Army looks through binoculars at a camp in the mountains near the village of Janudieh in the northern province of Idlib on March 18. The head of the rebel Free Syrian Army, Riad al-Asaad, announced on March 24 the formation of a military council grouping all rebel chiefs, including Syria's most senior army deserter General Mustafa al-Sheikh.

    AFP - Getty Images

    A defected Syrian soldier, now a member of the Free Syrian Army, displays a homemade nail bomb at a mountain outpost near the village of Janudieh in the northern province of Idlib on March 18.

    There have been many news reports on the Syrian rebels' plea to the international community for weapons to help their fight against President Bashar Assad and his forces. These images provide a good look at the informal weaponry they are dependent upon today. Recently, photojournalist Rodrigo Abd recalled his dangerous trip to report in Syria, where the homemade grenades carried by rebels who helped them travel through the country were as nerve wracking as the bombs and bullets flying overhead.

    AFP - Getty Images

    A defected Syrian soldier, now a member of the Free Syrian Army (FSA), holds an improvised explosive device (IED) at a camp in the northern rebel stronghold of Idlib near the Turkish border on March 17.

    International condemnation and high-level diplomacy have failed to stop the year-old Syria crisis, which the U.N. says has killed more than 8,000 people, many of them civilian protesters.

    More news from Syria

     

  • US halts $700 million in aid to Pakistan, demands action on Taliban bombs

    By NBC News, msnbc.com staff and news services

    Story updated 8:35 a.m. ET:

    A senior Pakistani official told NBC News the United States' decision to cut aid to Pakistan would only contribute to the growing sense of anti-Americanism within the population.

    He said the cut would deepen the perception within Pakistan that U.S. interests extend so far as its own foreign policy goals and would "strengthen our resolve to formalize and renegotiate our terms of engagement with USA."

    Following the NATO crossborder strike on November 26 that killed 24 Pakistani soldiers, military and government officials in Pakistan have called for a reassessment of the relationship with the U.S.

    The Army Chief issued new rules of engagement for his ground troops and commanders, granting them "full liberty" to respond with force if ever under attack, without any form of higher clearance.

    Story published 5:35 a.m. ET:

    ISLAMABAD - The United States has frozen $700 million in aid to Pakistan until it gets assurances that Islamabad is helping fight the spread of homemade bombs, a move likely to further strain ties between the countries.

    A Congressional panel halted the payment to Pakistan, a nuclear-armed country that is one of the largest recipients of U.S. foreign aid, late on Monday as part of a wider review of defense spending.

    Calls are growing in the U.S. to penalize Islamabad for failing to act against militant groups and, at worst, helping them, after the secret U.S. raid on a Pakistan garrison town in which al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden was killed in May.

    At least two dozen Pakistani troops along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border were killed by NATO aircraft, straining already tense relations between the U.S. and Pakistan. NBC's Atia Abawi reports.

    Homemade bombs, or improvised explosive devices (IEDs), are among militants' most effective weapons against U.S. and coalition troops in Afghanistan as they struggle to fight a resurgent Taliban insurgency.

    Many are made using ammonium nitrate, a common fertilizer smuggled across the border from Pakistan.

    The freeze on U.S. aid was agreed as part of a defense bill that is expected to be passed this week.

    The U.S. wants "assurances that Pakistan is countering improvised explosive devices in their country that are targeting our coalition forces," Representative Howard McKeon, a House Republican, told reporters.

    The U.S. has allocated some $20 billion in security and economic aid to Pakistan since 2001, much of it in the form of reimbursements for assistance in fighting militants.

    Although the frozen $700 million is only a small portion of aid to Pakistan, it could presage even greater cuts.

    Harm to Pakistan-US relations
    Salim Saifullah, chairman of Pakistan's Senate foreign relations committee, warned that relations, which are already at a low point, could worsen further following the decision, by the U.S. House-Senate panel.

    "I don't think this is a wise move. It could hurt ties. There should instead be efforts to increase cooperation. I don't see any good coming out of this," Saifullah told Reuters.

    There have been many proposals to make U.S. aid to Pakistan conditional on more cooperation in fighting militants such as the al-Qaida-linked Haqqani network, which Washington believes operates out of Pakistan and battles U.S. troops in Afghanistan.

    The White House is being careful in its response in part because officials don't have all the facts. NBC's Kristen Welker talks to NBC's Lester Holt about the balancing act.

    But Pakistan's civilian leaders have in the past warned against aid cuts, saying it would only harden public opinion against the U.S.

    Pakistan says it is doing all it can to fight al-Qaida and the Taliban and has lost thousands of soldiers since it joined the U.S.-led war in 2001, some of them at the hands of coalition troops.

    Islamabad has accused NATO of deliberately killing 24 Pakistani soldiers in an air strike near the Afghan border last month and shut down supplies for foreign troops in Afghanistan in anger.

    The decision to freeze aid could prompt Pakistan to harden its stance toward Washington.

    "I think the Pakistan side will understand the type of signal that is coming, which shows it's not only a question of aid," said former general and security analyst Talat Masood.

    "The whole attitude of the U.S. and the relationship will be affected by these measures because they know Pakistan will not be in a position to control the smuggling."

    Two fertilizer factories
    U.S. lawmakers said many Afghan bombs are made with fertilizer smuggled by militants across the border from Pakistan into Afghanistan.

    "The vast majority of the material used to make improvised explosive devices used against U.S. forces in Afghanistan originates from two fertilizer factories inside Pakistan," Republican Senator John McCain said in the Senate last week.

    A Congressional Research Service report in October said the Pakistani factories, owned by one of the country's biggest companies, Pakarab, have been producing over 300,000 metric tons of ammonium nitrate per year since 2004.

    The United States has urged Pakistan to regulate the distribution of ammonium nitrate to Afghanistan strictly. So far, Pakistan has only produced draft legislation on the issue.

    Pakistan's fragile economy is heavily dependent on agriculture, so cutting down on fertilizer output would hurt the sector.

    The provision freezing $700 million in aid was agreed upon by leaders of the armed services committees from both parties in the House and Senate, including McCain. It is part of compromise legislation authorizing U.S. defense programs expected to be approved this week, McKeon said.

    The bill would also require the Pentagon to deliver a strategy for improving the effectiveness of U.S. aid to Pakistan, he said.

    NBC News and Reuters contributed to this report.

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