Clashes and firefights between Taliban-linked militants and government troops in the troubled southern Afghanistan left 12 suspected rebels dead and injured 21 others, including 13 militants, local officials said Saturday.

"Taliban's attack on police post in Mian Nashin district in Kandahar province and counterattack, which lasted three hours, claimed the lives of 12 Taliban militants, while 13 others sustained injuries," spokesman of Kandahar Governor Mohammad Daud Ahmadi told Xinhua.

The militants took away their injured and dead bodies from the site of the fighting, he added.

Daud Ahmadi also confirmed that four police were injured in the exchange of fire.

Officials from the neighboring Helmand province also report of skirmishes between militants in government forces.

Taliban militants, according to Hajji Mohidin Khan, the spokesman of Helmand's provincial government, came in contact with police in the outskirts of provincial capital Lashkargah Friday night, as a result four police got wounded.

"Security forces have taken into custody 18 suspected militants, six of them apparently involved in attack on police patrol team last night," Khan added.

Taliban militias have yet to make any comment.

Kandahar, Helmand, Uruzgan and Zabul provinces, commonly known as the hotbed of Taliban, have been the scene of increasing insurgency over the past two years.

More than 400 people have lost their lives in Taliban-led insurgency over the past three weeks bringing the number of casualties to some 700 since the beginning of 2006.

Source: Xinhua