The incident raised the number of reported deaths in violence across Afghanistan this year to more than 300, most of them in a Taliban-led insurgency threatening plans for landmark elections this September.

Meanwhile, the Afghan government said it had reached an agreement with U.S. commanders on a new militia force to fight militants.

Two American soldiers were wounded when their convoy was attacked late Saturday near Gardez, 60 miles south of the capital, Kabul, in Paktia province, U.S. spokeswoman Lt. Col. Michele DeWerth said.

Airstrikes were called in, and four militants were killed, two were wounded and two others were detained, DeWerth said without elaborating.

However, provincial police chief Gen. Haygul Salemankhel said the shooting occurred as the convoy approached a police checkpoint after dark.

Three of his men were killed and two injured, and the wounded men were being treated at the nearby U.S. base, he said.

"Because of a misunderstanding, they opened fire on each other," Salemankhel said.

Paktia is in a broad swath of territory along the Pakistani border, where some 15,000 U.S.-led troops are battling stubborn Taliban-led insurgents.

The Afghan Defense Ministry said a new 2,000-strong Afghan Guard Force will help fight the militants. The force, to be based in Kabul, will be recruited from militia units across the country, ministry spokesman Gen. Zahir Azimi said.

"If they are needed in any place to suppress terrorism, we will send them," Azimi said.

The American military pressed for the guard force to formalize its existing cooperation with Afghan militias, saying it will help make them a more professional fighting force.

But the move counters a drive to disarm factional leaders and phase out unruly regional militias resisting the authority of U.S.-backed President Hamid Karzai.

The guard force will be disbanded after two years when the fledgling Afghan National Army will be strong enough to take up the slack, Azimi said.

The national army currently numbers about 10,000 men, far short of its planned strength of 70,000.

In Kabul, Karzai said suspected terrorists had poisoned three girls in Khost province earlier this week, apparently because they were going to school. Khost officials said the girls had recovered.

About a third of the country's girls are back in school after a Taliban-era ban on their education was lifted.

Karzai also met Sunday with former supporters of renegade warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar who now are willing to support the country's budding democracy.

The delegation said moderate leaders of Hekmatyar's Hizb-e Islami party wanted to contest the September elections.

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