Kabul, June 07: An Australian soldier has been killed during an operation in southern Afghanistan where a large cache of munitions belonging to militants was destroyed.
The casualty was the 27th Australian death in the Afghan conflict and the fourth in two weeks.
Australian Defense Force chief Marshal Angus Houston said early on Tuesday that the 23-year-old combat engineer was killed in Helmand province late on Monday.
Houston stated that the munitions cache included 70 anti-personnel mines, which are often used by insurgents to make improvised explosive devices.
Australia has 1,550 troops in Afghanistan and is the largest contributor to the US-led force there outside NATO.
——–Agencies