Three NATO troops killed by bomb in Afghanistan

KABUL: Three troops from the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) were killed by a roadside bomb in eastern Afghanistan Saturday, officials said.

ISAF did not say which country the dead troops were from or give further details in line with policy.

There are around 140,000 international troops in Afghanistan fighting a Taliban-led insurgency, 100,000 of them from the United States.

"Three International Security Assistance Force members died following an improvised explosive device attack in eastern Afghanistan today," an ISAF spokesman said.

Many of the decade-long Afghan war's worst fighting takes place in eastern Afghanistan, which is close to the border with Pakistan.

Pakistan closed its supply routes to NATO forces in Afghanistan after 24 Pakistani soldiers were killed by a NATO air strike last Saturday close to the mountainous, porous border, provoking a major diplomatic row between Islamabad and Washington.

The latest deaths take to 542 the number of coalition troops killed in Afghanistan this year, according to an AFP tally based on that kept by independent website iCasualties.org.