16 civilians - including women, children and doctors - have been killed in US-led coalition air strikes, according to an Afghan provincial governor.
The force has insisted, however, that the dead were militants.
The strikes happened yesterday in the remote district of Waygal in the mountainous northeast province of Nuristan, about 50km from the border with Pakistan.
Provincial governor Tamim Nuristani said that 16 civilians were killed as they were travelling out of the area after being told by security forces to leave ahead of an operation against Islamic insurgents.
Afghanistan politician shot dead
Unidentified gunmen have shot dead a member of parliament in southern Afghanistan.
Legislator Habibullah Jan was shot while driving in his home district of Zharai in Kandahar province late yesterday.
The legislator, aged around 55, was ambushed soon after leaving the home of one of his wives.
Mr Jan was also the head of Kandahar's prominent Alizai tribe and a former commander of the 1979-1989 anti-Soviet resistance.
Afghanistan's interior ministry said it is investigating who was behind the assassination.
A spokesman for the Taliban insurgent movement, which is active in Zharai and has carried out several targeted killings, said the Taliban was not involved in the shooting.
Mr Jan is the 10th member of parliament to be killed since Afghanistan's first democratically chosen parliament was elected in 2005.
In the most deadly incident, six MPs were among nearly 100 killed in a suicide bomb explosion in the northern province of Baghlan in November last year.
Meanwhile police in the southern province of Helmand said 10 Taliban militants were killed late yesterday when a mine exploded as they were trying to plant it in a road.
