WORLD NEWS

KABUL: An Afghan army commander said Saturday five Taliban militants were killed in the first hours of a combined assault on a militant stronghold in southern Afghanistan.

The offensive began before dawn when helicopters dropped US Marines and Afghan troops inside Marjah town, in the poppy-growing belt of Helmand province.

"According to initial reports, five enemy have been killed," said Sher Mohammad Zazai, commander of the Afghan Army's 205 Corps."Two were killed in one location, three in another. They were killed in face-to-face fighting," he told reporters by video link from Helmand's capital of Lashkar Gah.

U.S.-led NATO troops launched a major offensive on Saturday against the Taliban's last big stronghold in Afghanistan's most violent province, a test of President Barack Obama's troop surge strategy.

The assault, the first since the U.S. president ordered an extra 30,000 troops to Afghanistan in December, is the start of a campaign to impose government control on rebel-held areas this year, before U.S. forces start to withdraw in 2011.

A dozen helicopters flew from south of Marjah in Helmand province and the first objective of U.S. Marines was to take the town centre despite the risk of being blown up by bombs rigged by the Taliban.

The U.S. military said about 4,500 U.S. Marines, 1,500Afghan troops and 300 U.S. soldiers were taking part in the offensive.

The operation, codenamed Mushtarak, or "together", may havebeen labelled as such to highlight that NATO and Afghan forces were working closely to bring stability to Afghanistan, a country battered by decades of conflict.