Roundup: Afghan conflict claims 15 lives including 7 insurgents within day

Militancy and counter-militancy have claimed 15 lives including seven Taliban militants and eight security personnel in the militancy-hit Afghanistan on Thursday, officials said.

In the latest violent incident, seven militants were killed as artillery units of national army pounded Taliban hideout in the northern Takhar province, an official said.

"Artillery of security forces pounded Taliban positions in Surkhtapa village of Qala-e-Zal district, Takhar province Thursday at noon time killing seven insurgents on the spot and wounding five others," an army spokesman in the province, Ghulam Hazrat told Xinhua.

In a related incident which occurred in Taliban former stronghold the southern Helmand province on the same day Thursday, seven police were killed, police said.

"Unidentified armed men shot dead seven police personnel on a checkpoint in Bartaqi area of Garmsir district, Helmand province Thursday morning," district police chief Timor Shah Nazari told Xinhua.

The attackers after killing the seven police men also took their weapons and made their good escape, the official said.

Investigation has been initiated into the case, he added.

Helmand province has been regarded as Taliban hotbed and the armed insurgents have been fighting security forces in different parts of the troubled province over the past few years.

Moreover, conflict between Taliban and Afghan security forces claimed the life of one soldier and injured two others in the eastern Kunar province on Thursday, provincial police chief Abdul Habib Sayedkhili said.

Militancy and conflict usually get momentum in spring and summer in Afghanistan commonly known as fighting season among Afghans. Endi