KABUL (Reuters) - Artillery shells fired from Pakistan landed in an Afghan army compound and close to an international military base in Afghanistan on Saturday and NATO forces returned fire, the alliance said.
Elsewhere in Afghanistan, an improvised explosive device(IED) killed four U.S.-led coalition soldiers in the southernprovince of Kandahar, the scene of a large anti-Talibanoffensive and an insurgent jail break.
Tension has mounted between Afghanistan and Pakistan in thelast week after Afghan President Hamid Karzai threatened tosend troops across the frontier to hunt down Taliban militantsbased in Pakistan's lawless border region.
"An ISAF (International Security Assistance Force) forwardoperating base and an Afghan National Army compound innortheastern Paktika province were attacked with indirect firefrom across the Afghanistan-Pakistan border today," an ISAFstatement said. No casualties were reported.
Three artillery rounds landed near the ISAF base and threerounds landed inside an Afghan army compound, it said. "ISAFforces determined the origination of the rounds to be inPakistan and returned artillery fire in self-defence."
The Pakistani military was notified immediately when ISAFforces came under fire, the statement said. The armies ofPakistan, Afghanistan and ISAF maintain open channels ofcommunication to avoid escalating any conflict.
A suspected Taliban rocket also hit a hospital in thenortheastern town of Asadabad close to the Pakistan border onSaturday, killing one man and wounding another man and a woman,provincial Governor Sayed Fazlullah Wahidi said. He said therocket appeared to have been fired from across the borderinside Pakistan.
Taliban insurgents are able to train, equip themselves andlaunch attacks into Afghanistan from Pakistan's tribal beltbefore returning to rest and regroup, analysts say.
The Taliban leadership also directs its campaign to oustthe pro-Western Afghan government and drive out foreign forcesfrom bases inside Pakistan. Pakistan denies the charges andsays it has little power over its autonomous border regions.
In Kandahar, two coalition soldiers were also wounded inthe IED blast, a U.S. military statement said, without givingfurther details.
The Taliban have upped pressure on Kandahar in the past twoweeks, freeing at least 300 of their comrades in the jailbreak, then occupying areas outside the town, forcing Afghanand foreign troops to launch a large offensive to clear themout.
In another incident, an IED killed a Polish soldier fromthe ISAF and wounded four more on Saturday in Paktika province,the Polish news agency (PAP) said.
(Writing by Jon Hemming; Editing by Janet Lawrence)
