Foreign troops kill Afghan police

KANDAHAR: An Afghan police commander on Wednesday accused international troops of killing two policemen by accident in one of the most potent Taliban strongholds in the south.

Kandahar provincial police chief Abdul Raziq said the victims were members of the Afghan Local Police (ALP), an anti-Taliban initiative in which local people are recruited to protect their own villages.

A spokesman for NATO's US-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in the Afghan capital Kabul said the military was looking into what reportedly happened late Tuesday in the Arghandab district of Kandahar province. "They were mistaken for insurgents," Raziq told AFP. "The police returned fire and there was a brief exchange of fire."

Faiz Mohammad, who worked alongside the dead men, said they were praying when they came under fire from foreign forces. He added that four other people were wounded and evacuated by ISAF for treatment.

An ISAF spokesman said it was investigating the incident.