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Afghanistan says foreign fighters coming from Iraq | World | Reuters

Afghanistan says foreign fighters coming from Iraq | World | Reuters

KABUL (Reuters) - With the reduction of violence in Iraq, foreign militants were now flooding into Afghanistan to join Taliban insurgents battling Afghan and international troops, the Afghan defence minister said on Wednesday.

There was a 33 percent rise in insurgent attacks in Afghanistan in 2008, according to NATO-led forces.

Violence is expected to rise further in 2009 as Washington prepares to send up to 25,000 more troops into new areas of the southern Pashtun heartlands.

Defence Minister Abdul Rahim Wardak said there were about 15,000 Taliban fighters in Afghanistan but their numbers were being swelled by foreign insurgents moving in from Iraq, where violence has fallen after a U.S. troop "surge" and other measures.

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