Five US soldiers have been killed in bombings over the past 24 hours in Afghanistan, NATO's international Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said Sunday.
Two of the troopers were killed in a home-made bomb explosion in the country's south, where the insurgency is most intense, the force said in a statement.
"Two ISAF service members from the United States were killed today in an IED strike in southern Afghanistan," ISAF said, referring to the improvised explosive devices, or roadside bombs, which have been the scourge of foreign troops fighting the Taliban.
The force announced a third IED death in the south shortly after, taking to five the number of American soldiers killed in Afghanistan in past 24 hours.
The statements did not disclose the exact location of the incidents but much of southern Afghanistan is wracked by the Taliban insurgency.
With the last deaths, 38 foreign soldiers, including 25 US nationals, have been killed this year fighting a Taliban insurgency which is at its deadliest since the Islamist regime was ousted by a US-led invasion in 2001.
The AFP tally is based on that kept by the independent icasualties.org website, which tracks military deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Around 113,000 international troops are deployed in Afghanistan under US and NATO command and this will increase to more than 140,000 troops in 2010 under the Washington's new war strategy for the country.
The reinforcements, which include about 30,000 US troops and nearly 10,000 from NATO, will be mostly deployed in the southern province of Helmand, the heartland of the insurgency.
Some of the troops will help train Afghan security forces. There are about 100,000 troops in the Afghan army and about 80,000 police already trained since the 2001 toppling of the Taliban.
Home-made bombs are a weapon of choice for Taliban militants in their campaign against the well-armed Western and Afghan troops.
Afghanistan Sunday postponed its parliamentary polls for four months, days ahead of crunch international talks on the war-torn nation in London, saying it was not safe to go ahead amid the spiralling insurgency.
