Bomb Blast Kills Nato Service Member In Afghanistan

Bomb blast kills NATO service member in Afghanistan 2012-04-25 09:56:03 GMT+7 (ICT) KABUL, AFGHANISTAN (BNO NEWS) -- A coalition service member was killed on Tuesday when a roadside bomb exploded in southern Afghanistan, the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said. Few other details were immediately released.ISAF said one of its service members was killed when an improvised explosive device (IED) exploded in Afghanistan's south. But because the multinational force defers the release of specific details to national authorities, no other details about the incident were released, including the exact location.The nationality of the service member involved was also not immediately disclosed by ISAF. "It is ISAF policy to defer casualty identification procedures to the relevant national authorities," a brief statement said.Also on Monday, the U.S. Department of Defense identified the four soldiers who were killed on late Thursday evening when their Black Hawk (UH-60) helicopter crashed in Helmand province, located in southern Afghanistan. The soldiers were assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 25th Aviation Regiment, 25th Combat Aviation Brigade, 25th Infantry Division at Wheeler Army Airfield in Hawaii.The exact cause of the accident is under investigation, but U.S. officials have said they do not believe enemy fire was involved. "We still believe that weather was the principal cause," Pentagon spokesman Navy Capt. John Kirby said on Friday. "They're going to look at all factors, but right now it appears that weather was the principal cause."The U.S. Department of Defense identified the four victims as 27-year-old Chief Warrant Officer Nicholas S. Johnson, of San Diego, California; 25-year-old Chief Warrant Officer Don C. Viray, of Waipahu, Hawaii; 33-year-old Sgt. Chris J. Workman, of Boise, Idaho; and 23-year-old Sgt. Dean R. Shaffer, of Pekin, Illinois.Tuesday's death raises the number of coalition troops killed in Afghanistan so far this year to 124, most of them American and British service members, according to official figures. A U.S. Marine and two U.S. soldiers were killed on Sunday as a result of two separate IED attacks in Afghanistan.A total of 566 ISAF troops were killed in Afghanistan in 2011, down from 711 in 2010. A majority of the fallen troops were American and were killed in the country's south, which is plagued by IED attacks on troops and civilians.There are currently more than 130,000 ISAF troops in Afghanistan, including some 90,000 U.S. troops and more than 9,500 British soldiers. U.S. President Barack Obama previously ordered a drawdown of 23,000 U.S. troops later this year, and foreign combat troops are due to leave Afghanistan by the end of 2014.

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