Kabul, Mar 21: An explosion killed a soldier from NATO-led forces in southern Afghanistan, the alliance said in a statement on Friday. Violence has surged in Afghanistan in the last two years, with some 6,000 people killed in 2007, the deadliest year since US-led and Afghan forces toppled the Taliban in 2001.

The blast happened on Thursday during a patrol in southern Afghanistan, an area where foreign troops are engaged in daily battles with Taliban militants who are fighting to overthrow the pro-Western Afghan government and drive out foreign troops.

The NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) does not release the nationalities of its casualties, but most of its soldiers in southern Afghanistan are American, British, Canadian or Dutch. More than 200 foreign troops were killed in Afghanistan in 2007.