Afghanistan timeline

December 29, 2002

• A Pakistani border guard shot and wounded a U.S. soldier in the head in eastern Afghanistan's Paktika province, just a few hundred yards from Pakistan's border. The shooting prompted U.S. forces to call in an airstrike on a building where the guard was believed hiding. Pakistan claimed the building was on its side of the border, but the Americans claimed it was on the Afghan side. The soldier was evacuated to the U.S. military's medical center in Landstuhl, Germany , then transferred to a nearby German hospital for more specific neurological treatment, and a week later flown home to the United States. The border guard was taken into custody. The situation grew more tense when Pakistan dispatched extra troops to the border after the United States said it reserved the right to cross into Pakistan in hot pursuit of enemy fighters fleeing from Afghanistan.
• A second U.S. soldier arrived at Landstuhl, Germany after being shot in the head the day before at Kandahar U.S. base, but not from hostile fire.

December 27, 2002

• In the Gardez province of Afghanistan, five people were killed and six wounded when guests at a wedding party fired a rocket propelled grenade into the air, only to have it land nearby and explode.

December 17, 2002

• A grenade was thrown into a jeep carrying two U.S. Special Forces soldiers driving through Kabul, Afghanistan. One soldier suffered an eye injury and the other a leg injury. Their Afghan interpreter also was injured. Amir Mohammad was later taken into custody for the crime. He revealed that he had received terror training at a camp inside Afghanistan. Allegedly, he and about a dozen other men trained for a week at a base six miles from the border with Pakistan. About a dozen teachers taught the students how to use guns and bombs. Five students then traveled to Kabul looking for American targets.

December 12, 2002

• The Afghan Cable Center in Jalalabad, which had been broadcasting more than 20 foreign television channels, was closed down by a special decision of the Afghanistan Supreme Court presided over by chief justice Mowlawi Fazl Hadi Shinwari .

December 10, 2002

• A second prisoner died (the first one dying on December 3, 2002) at the makeshift prison in the United States compound at an Afghan base north of Kabul. Later, the autopsies would label the deaths as homicides.

December 2, 2002

• Fierce clashes between forces of Amanullah Khan and Ismail Khan resumed in western Afghanistan.
• Three people were killed and five wounded in a gun battle between police and fighters of a military commander in the southern city of Kandahar, Afghanistan.
• U.S. special forces based in Lwara , near Khost, called in AH-64 Apache attack helicopter support to help chase five people seen moving in the vicinity of the base. A small team of soldiers discovered five rockets in the area where the suspects had been seen and one person was detained for questioning. The five suspects fled into a building two miles away.
• U.S. special forces near Jalalabad came under fire from 10 people using automatic weapons who then fled for cover in nearby hills. A-10 gunships were called in to drop flares in the target area.

December 1, 2002

• A group of armed Afghans patrolling outside Shindand air base stopped another group of armed Afghans on the roadside. The second group then fired at the patrol. U.S. soldiers who were inside the air base, also came under fire. They returned fire, then called for air support while making their escape. A B-52 bomber dropped seven 2,000-pound laser-guided bombs, killing at least seven.
• Unidentified attackers fired four rockets at a U.S.-controlled airport in the eastern city of Khost, Afghanistan.
• Japan's defense minister Shigeru Ishiba denied that its government had decided to send a high-tech Aegis destroyer to back up U.S. military action in Afghanistan.
• Afghan commander Amanullah Khan launched an attack on positions held by the governor of Herat province, Ismail Khan, in the Zeer Koh area six miles from Shindand air base. Up to 13 people were feared dead and dozens wounded.