NATO: Afghan civilians killed in attacks vs. Taliban

KABUL - NATO acknowledged an undetermined number of Afghan civilians were killed yesterday in fighting with the Taliban in eastern Afghanistan and promised to provide compensation to their families.

Also yesterday, a suicide car bomber struck a convoy of NATO troops and Afghan police in northern Afghanistan, killing seven police officers and wounding at least 11 people.

The civilian deaths occurred in two separate attacks before dawn yesterday in eastern Nangarhar province, local officials said. Eight members of an extended family died when a helicopter opened fire on vehicles carrying the family and the body of a flood victim to their home village, according to Haji Mohammed Hassan, chief of Khogyani district of Nangarhar.

Separately, 13 people were killed when U.S. and Afghan forces raided a compound in the Sherzad district, according to village elder Rahmatullah Sherzad.

NATO first reported that a joint force targeted a compound in the village of Khwazakheyl in the province's Sherzad district looking for a Taliban commander. Troops took fire from three locations as they approached. They returned fire, killing "several insurgents," the NATO statement said, and various weapons were found at the scene.

Sherzad told The Associated Press that the joint force surrounded the home of a villager. Family members opened fire because they feared for their safety, he said, insisting they were not Taliban.

Later, NATO stated "it appears that between four and a dozen or more civilians were killed" during operations in Nangarhar. The statement said between 15 and 20 insurgents, including two senior Taliban commanders, died in the fighting in Khwazakheyl.