Khost Province police chief Abdul Qayum Bagzoi reported this morning that US forces had killed two innocent farmers just outside of Khost city. The attack came just days after an attack by US forces in Kunduz Province killed five civilians inside the home of a local mayor.

Once again, US officials have denied that those killed were civilians, yet the case against those killed seems remarkably weak. US spokesman Col. Greg Julian reports that the patrol saw two “military-aged males” digging outside after curfew. They were then killed. Col. Julian declared that “they were not civilians to the best of our knowledge.”

The rising death toll across Afghanistan is complicating President Obama’s attempt to present a new “comprehensive strategy” for the war there, and the government’s objections to repeated killings by the international forces in driving a rift between the two.

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