Newswire21.org

Two US troops and a British soldier were killed in Afghanistan from bombs, according to NATO, underscoring concerns about a rising insurgency as the US considers escalation of the 8-year-old conflict.

The new deaths came a day after Afghan intelligence chief Abdulla Laghmani and 21 others were slain by a suicide bomber just east of Kabul. They come after the deadliest month for US forces; 49 troops died in August.

The violence is coming as US President Obama is reviewing military reports that are believed to lay the groundwork for increasing US troop strength in Afghanistan above the current level of 62,000.

Obama's decision is further complicated by charges of corruption in the administration of President Hamid Karzai and Afghan's emergence as the leading producer of opium.

Election officials have no collected more than 2,600 significant complaints of voter fraud in last month's election, including some that involved ballot-stuffing by Karzai's supporters.

The UN said this week that opium production declined by 10 percent in the past year. Prior to the new report, the UN estimates Afghanistan produced 93 percent of the world's supply of opium. There was virtually no opium production prior to the US invastion eight years ago.

Troops Levels
Obama deployed an additional 21,000 American troops to Afghanistan prior to the election with a warning that the campaign there would be hard and long. A further increase would likely require support from conservatives from the Republican party and put Obama at odds with members of his own party, who fear Afghanistan could turn into another Vietnam.

In addition to US troops, the Pentagon also employs tens of thousands of private contractors in the country. The New York Times estimated that 57 percent of the Pentagon's force in Afghanistan were contractors as of March, the highest level for any war in history.