Five NATO service members were killed Thursday in southern Afghanistan, the scene of heavy fighting as troops push into areas long controlled by the Taliban, the coalition said. Three died when a homemade bomb exploded and two were killed separately - one following an insurgent attack and another in an explosion.
No other details or the nationalities of the troops was immediately disclosed.
5 NATO service members killed in Afghanistan
Ed Miliband: Blair 'wrong' on Iraq war
New Labour leader Ed Miliband today conceded the conflict in Iraq had divided the country and said Tony Blair's government was "wrong" to go to war.
"I criticise nobody faced with making the toughest of decisions and I honour our troops who fought and died there. But I do believe that we were wrong. Wrong to take Britain to war and we need to be honest about that.
CIA steps up drone attacks in Pakistan amid fear of 'credible but not specific attacks'
A sharply escalated campaign of CIA drone strikes in Pakistan is aimed in part at al-Qaeda units suspected of planning terrorist attacks on targets in Europe, a threat that U.S. officials described as "credible but not specific" enough to allow authorities to anticipate precisely where or when a strike might occur.
The intensified bombing of targets in North and South Waziristan represents an expansion of the secret drone program from its origins as a weapon used in a selective hunt for high-ranking operatives to one now delivering a barrage of strikes in the hopes of disrupting a still-murky plot.
US Businessman: Blackwater Paid Me to Buy Steroids and Weapons on Black Market for Its Shooters
A Texas businessman who has worked extensively in Iraq claims that Blackwater paid him to purchase steroids and other drugs for its operatives in Baghdad, as well as more than 100 AK47s and massive amounts of ammunition on Baghdad's black market.
Howard Lowry, who worked in Iraq from 2003-2009, also claims that he personally attended Blackwater parties where company personnel had large amounts of cocaine and blocks of hashish and would run around naked.
Blackwater's Black Ops
Over the past several years, entities closely linked to the private security firm Blackwater have provided intelligence, training and security services to US and foreign governments as well as several multinational corporations, including Monsanto, Chevron, the Walt Disney Company, Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines and banking giants Deutsche Bank and Barclays, according to documents obtained by The Nation.
Blackwater's work for corporations and government agencies was contracted using two companies owned by Blackwater's owner and founder, Erik Prince: Total Intelligence Solutions and the Terrorism Research Center (TRC). Prince is listed as the chairman of both companies in internal company documents, which show how the web of companies functions as a highly coordinated operation. Officials from Total Intelligence, TRC and Blackwater (which now calls itself Xe Services) did not respond to numerous requests for comment for this article.
3,000 Man CIA Afghan Army Conducts Operations In Pakistan
The CIA created, controls and pays for a clandestine 3,000-man paramilitary army of local Afghans, known as Counterterrorism Pursuit Teams. Woodward describes these teams as elite, well-trained units that conduct highly sensitive covert operations into Pakistan as part of a stepped-up campaign against al-Qaeda and Afghan Taliban havens there.
Children of al-Qaeda in Iraq pay for sins of their fathers
Zahraa is a rambunctious toddler. She still sucks on a pacifier and her mother dresses her in pink. But according to the government, she does not exist. The daughter of an al-Qaeda in Iraq militant who forced her mother into marriage and motherhood, then disappeared, Zahraa is one of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of children whose births amid the anarchy and insurgent violence of Iraq were never legally recorded.
Without the paperwork to prove that she is the the child of an Iraqi man and that her parents were joined in a legitimate marriage before her birth, Zahraa and others like her have no rights as Iraqi citizens, legal experts say. They do not have birth certificates, passports, or national identification cards and will be unable to go to school or hold a government job.
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