US Service Member Killed in Afghanistan Shooting
The circumstances behind the attack aren't clear.
— -- U.S. officials confirm that a U.S. service member was killed in a shooting incident in Jalalabad, Afghanistan, that left seven others wounded. Initial indications are that the shooting may have involved a member of the Afghan Security Forces.
A statement released by the military coalition in Afghanistan known as “Resolute Support” confirmed the death of a service member in an incident in Jalalabad in eastern Afghanistan.
The U.S. military fatality is the first U.S. military fatality in 2015 since the U.S. and NATO ended the combat mission in Afghanistan.
Some 9,800 U.S. troops remain in Afghanistan as part of a two-year training mission known as Resolute Support. One official said initial indications were that the shooter may have been a member of the Afghan Security Forces but that officials were still trying to determine the circumstances behind the incident. In a statement, the U.S. Embassy in Kabul acknowledged that the incident had taken place after a senior U.S. official had held a meeting with the provincial governor.
“We are aware that there was an exchange of gunfire involving Resolute Support service members near the provincial governor's compound in Jalalabad,” according to the statement. “The incident took place after a senior U.S. official held a meeting with the provincial governor. All Chief of Mission personnel of the visiting party are accounted for.”
Separately, the U.S. embassy tweeted later that U.S. ambassador P. Michael McKinley was in Kabul and not present at this meeting. Hazrat Hussain Mashriqi Wall, the spokesperson for the Jalalabad police chief, told ABC News there had a meeting in Jalalabad between Afghan and U.S. officials.
Following the meeting, he said, most of the senior delegation of U.S officials left by helicopter. As some of the ground troops who had provided security for the meeting left by convoy they were fired upon by an Afghan national army soldier standing in the back of a military pickup truck. He said the American troops returned fire, killing one Afghan soldier and wounding two others.