Three British NATO soldiers were killed in an apparent friendly fire incident in Afghanistan when US jets dropped a bomb on them during a firefight with Taliban militants, officials said Friday.
The incident, near Kajaki in southern Helmand province, occurred late Thursday when two United States warplanes were called to provide support after an attack by the rebels, the Ministry of Defence in London said.
"Their patrol was attacked by Taliban insurgents and during the intense engagement that ensued, close air support was called in from two US F15 aircraft to repel the enemy," a ministry statement said.
"A single bomb was dropped and it is believed the explosion killed all three soldiers who were declared dead at the scene."
The British army has now launched an investigation into the incident.
The soldiers were all from 1st Battalion the Royal Anglian Regiment. Two others were injured in the attack and are being treated at Camp Bastion, the main base in Helmand.
The NATO-led International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan in a separate statement confirmed the deaths of three of its troops "on operations" but did not give their nationalities.
"Three ISAF (International Security Assistance Force) soldiers have been killed and two others injured while on operations in southern Afghanistan on August 23," an ISAF statement said.
"All ISAF troops continue to work in difficult, dangerous and challenging conditions, and do so with the utmost professionalism," the statement said, quoting Lieutenant Colonel Bridget Rose, an ISAF spokesperson.
Britain has more than 6,000 troops in Afghanistan, a figure which will increase to over 7,700 this year. They are mostly deployed in the south. A total of 73 British troops have been killed in Afghanistan since 2001.
So-called friendly fire deaths caused by US forces are a sensitive issue in Britain, where an investigating coroner ruled earlier this year that a British soldier was unlawfully killed by US pilots in Iraq.
Lance Corporal Matty Hull died in March 2003 when two US planes opened fire on his tank near Basra, southern Iraq, after mistaking a British convoy for enemy vehicles.
Oxford coroner Andrew Walker repeatedly expressed his frustration at the Pentagon's failure to provide vital information and witnesses into the death of the soldier.
He ruled that Hull's death was a criminal breach of the international law of armed conflict.
Thursday's deaths in Afghanistan brought to 142 the number of foreign soldiers killed in the country this year, most of them in combat with the Taliban, who are waging an increasingly bloody insurgency.
A foreign soldier was killed on Thursday in a traffic incident on a crowded road just north of Kabul, ISAF said in a statement.
