Three NATO troops killed in latest Afghan insider attack

Three coalition troops were killed in eastern Afghanistan on Sunday in the latest insider attack by Afghans against U.S. and coalition forces. 

{mosads}The attack took place in Gardez, located in Paktia province along the volatile Afghan-Pakistan border, Afghan defense ministry officials told The Guardian. 

The shooter, dressed in an Afghan National Security Forces uniform, opened fire on the coalition troops, killing three before being killed by Afghan troops operating alongside allied forces. 

Afghan defense ministry spokesman General Mohammad Zahir Azimi said Kabul was investigating the incident, with assistance from the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) command. 

Local officials told The Guardian the three slain coalition troops were special operations forces members, but did not confirm the soldiers’ nationality. 

ISAF has yet to release an official casualty report identifying the soldiers who were killed. 

Sunday’s attack breaks the recent lull in violence against U.S. and coalition forces by their Afghan counterparts. 

Before Sunday, the most recent insider attack against allied forces in Afghanistan took place in July at Kandahar airfield in the southern part of the country. 

{mossecondads}The shooter, a member of the Afghan National Army, fired on American and NATO soldiers based in Kandahar. Three U.S. troops were wounded in the exchange of gunfire. 

The Afghan soldier survived the attack and was taken into custody by ISAF and Afghan forces. 

American and Afghan forces are bracing for a possible large-scale Taliban offensive in Paktia and elsewhere in eastern Afghanistan as this year’s fighting season in the country comes to a close. 

“We expect the enemies of the Afghan people to come out and try to achieve those objectives that they’ve not been able to achieve,” Maj. Gen. James McConville, the top U.S. commander for Regional Command-East (RC-East), said in August. 

“We’re expecting a spike in violence,” McConville told reporters at the Pentagon via teleconference from Bagram Air Field in Afghanistan. 

“They’re gonna have to do something because … they haven’t met their objectives,” he added. 

In July, one American soldier was killed and three others wounded after a brazen nighttime attack against U.S. forces conducting security operations outside Combat Outpost Chamkani in Paktia. 

The slain soldiers were attached to 4th Brigade Combat Team (BCT), 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) headquartered at Forward Operating Base Salerno in Khost Province. 

Volatile provinces in eastern Afghanistan along the country’s border with Pakistan were the last areas to be handed over from U.S. forces to Afghan National Security Forces in June.