International troops at the site of a blast in Afghanistan, March 3 (epa)
March 4, 2006 -- The French defense ministry says that a French naval officer serving with special forces was killed today during an "armed skirmish" with Taliban fighters in southern Afghanistan.
The ministry gave no further details.
The soldier is the second French soldier to be killed in Afghanistan.
Some 200 French soldiers have been deployed since 2003 to assist U.S. military operations against the Taliban in southeastern Afghanistan.
Canadian forces said that one of their soliders was seriously wounded today in a separate clash in the Shawali Kot district of Kandahar.
(AFP, dpa)
RFE/RL Afghanistan Report
RFE/RL Afghanistan Report
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