KANDAHAR, Feb 25: At least 22 rebels and troops have been killed in a renewed surge in violence in Afghanistan, US and Afghan officials said on Friday.

Gunmen killed nine Afghan troops in southern Helmand province near the border with Pakistan, a provincial government official said on Friday, in one of the bloodiest attacks against Afghan forces for months.

The soldiers were killed while on a night patrol in the Chakool Ghar area of the province. "Two of those killed were officers and the other seven were soldiers," said Haji Mohammad Wali, spokesman for the provincial governor. "The car they were travelling and their weapons have gone missing, too."

Haji Wali said it was not clear who was behind the attack but a Taliban spokesman said their fighters were responsible. "Our mujahideen killed the soldiers in an ambush," Taliban spokesman Abdul Latif Hakimi said by telephone from an undisclosed location.

The US military said seven Taliban rebels also died on Thursday during a US helicopter raid in the south eastern province of Khost after five Afghan soldiers were wounded in an ambush.

Afghan officials said their forces killed six more Taliban guerillas after the ambush. A Taliban spokesman said five Taliban fighters died. A US military statement said there were no casualties among US-led forces.

Helmand was a bastion of the Taliban until they were driven from power in late 2001 and it is also one of Afghanistan's major drug producing areas. Last week, gunmen killed two Afghan aid workers and stole their vehicle in the province.

Mr Wali said the Taliban also killed an Afghan soldier and wounded three others in an attack on their post in a mountainous area near the eastern city of Jalalabad on Friday.

Taliban activity has eased over the winter, and US-led forces operating in the south and south east have kept up the pressure on Afghanistan's vanquished rulers following their failure to disrupt an historic presidential election in October. -Reuters