Warfare in News

On what Prime Minister David Cameron has described as a 'desperately sad day for our country', the Ministry of Defence has confirmed that six UK soldiers have been killed in southern Afghanistan.

Five soldiers from the 3rd Battalion the Yorkshire Regiment and one from the 1st Battalion The Duke of Lancaster's Regiment were on a security patrol in a Warrior armoured fighting vehicle when it was caught in an explosion in Kandahar province on Tuesday and suffered 'catastrophic damage'.

They had been travelling as part of a two Warrior patrol when the vehicle was hit at a junction where a road travelling east from Gereshk meets another heading north to Lashkar Gah, the MoD said.

The explosion is believed to have been caused by wither a roadside bomb or a so-called legacy mine, left over from the Soviet era.

The six soldiers had been in the country for less than a month. The number of British military deaths in Afghanistan since 2001 now totals 404. This incident is the biggest single loss of UK life at one time in Afghanistan since a Nimrod crash killed 14 in 2006.

On what Prime Minister David Cameron has described as a 'desperately sad day for our country', the Ministry of Defence has confirmed that six UK soldiers have been killed in southern Afghanistan. Five soldiers from the 3rd Battalion the Yorkshire Regiment and one from the 1st Battalion The Duke of Lancaster's Regiment were on a security patrol in a Warrior armoured fighting vehicle when it was caught in an explosion in Kandahar province on Tuesday and suffered 'catastrophic damage'. They had been travelling as part of a two Warrior patrol when the vehicle was hit at a junction where a road travelling east from Gereshk meets another heading north to Lashkar Gah, the MoD said. The explosion is believed to have been caused by wither a roadside bomb or a so-called legacy mine, left over from the Soviet era. The six soldiers had been in the country for less than a month. The number of British military deaths in Afghanistan since 2001 now totals 404. This incident is the biggest single loss of UK life at one time in Afghanistan since a Nimrod crash killed 14 in 2006.