KABUL, Aug. 5 (Xinhua) -- One suspected Taliban insurgent and one Afghan police were killed and six others including four militants were wounded as they engaged in Afghanistan's southern Ghazni province, a senior provincial official said Saturday.

    "The incident occurred in Waghaz district Friday evening as a result one policeman was killed and two others wounded," provincial police chief Tafsir Khan Khogyani told Xinhua.

    One rebel was killed and four others got injured in the fire exchange, he added.

    The militants, he added had taken their injured comrades to unknown place.

    "Police have also taken into custody 15 persons in the district on charge of having link with the insurgents," Khogyani added.

    Southern provinces of Afghanistan have been the scene of increasing militancy over the past year as more than 600 militants, according to officials, have been killed since early June.

    Four Canadian soldiers were killed the neighboring Kandahar province on Thursday.

    Taliban-linked insurgency has claimed the lives of 1,700 people, mostly militants since beginning this year in the post-Taliban central Asian state. Enditem

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