US-led raid kills Afghan civilians

Three women and a child have been killed along with several Afghan fighters in an air raid led by US forces, the US-led coalition has said.   The deaths came as US troops were targeting two Afghan leaders in the Paktia province allegedly involved in setting up attacks with explosives, according to a coalition statement released on Wednesday.

The troops responded with heavy gunfire when they were fired upon and the clashes "resulted in four civilian deaths [with] one civilian injured", the statement read.

One of the two "militant leaders" was involved in improvised bomb attacks on international troops while the other was facilitating "foreign fighter operations," according to the statement.

'Tragic' incident 

Rumi Nielson, a US military spokesman, said the four civilians who died were all in the same buildings in which the fighters were firing from.   Nielson said the attack was "tragic".   Scores of civilians have died in operations against the Taliban by international and Afghan troops.   The casualties have caused widespread outrage in the country and Hamid Karzai, the Afghan president, has repeatedly called on US and other western troops to avoid civilian deaths during operations.   More than 70,000 international troops operating under Nato and the US-led coalition in Afghanistan.