Five Australian soldiers killed in Afghan incidents

[dipsydoodle]

Source: Reuters

(Reuters) - Australia suffered its worst combat losses since the Vietnam War when five troops were killed in Afghanistan, officials said on Thursday, prompting Prime Minister Julia Gillard to return home early from a regional Pacific leaders' conference.

Officials from the Australian Defence Force and the NATO-led coalition said three Australians had been killed in southern Afghanistan on Wednesday by an Afghan wearing a soldier's uniform, bringing to 45 the number of NATO-led coalition troops killed in rogue shootings this year.

Australian officials later announced another two troops had died in a helicopter crash in the south on Thursday.

"This is news so truly shocking that it's going to feel for many Australians like a physical blow," an emotional Gillard told reporters in the Cook Islands, where she was attending a forum of Pacific islands leaders.

Read more: http://uk.reuters.com/article/2012/08/30/uk-afghanistan-shootings-idUKBRE87T08720120830

[Downwinder]

1. "We are there for a purpose

and we will see that purpose through," Gillard said.

What purpose?

[Matilda]

3. After ten years, where are we?

It doesn't matter whether it's the Taliban or the war lords on top, the results will be the same.

We are making no difference at all. Nobody ever has in Afghanistan.

[Cherchez la Femme]

2. Seem's as if they're targeting Australians

Last edited Thu Aug 30, 2012, 05:15 PM - Edit history (1)

The Somalia Gambit?