KABUL - Two U.S. Marines were killed in a battle with insurgents in Afghanistan, the U.S. military said on Monday, the latest casualties in a surge of rebel violence.

The Marines were hunting for a group of insurgents northwest of the eastern city of Jalalabad, on Sunday, when the clash with about 25 rebels erupted, the U.S. military said in a statement.

"The Marines had intelligence that insurgents were in the region and sought out the insurgent location. The Marines located the insurgents and an engagement ensued," it said.
The names of the two dead Marines were being withheld, pending notification to next of kin, it said.

Taliban rebels have launched a string of attacks on U.S.-led and Afghan government forces in recent weeks, after a winter lull in violence raised hope their insurgency might be fading.

More than 100 people, most of them militants, but including several members of the 18,300-strong U.S.-led force, have been killed in the south and east since late March.

About 60 insurgents and 10 soldiers and police were killed in two clashes last week in the south of the country, the U.S. military said.

A Taliban spokesman denied that his men had suffered such heavy losses, saying most of the dead were villagers.

U.S. and Afghan opposition forces drove the Taliban from power in 2001 after they refused to hand over Osama bin Laden, architect of the Sept. 11 attacks.

U.S.-backed President Hamid Karzai has offered an amnesty to Taliban rank-and-file and while a handful, including some local-level commanders, have given up, there has not been a flood of defections.

The insurgents failed in a vow to disrupt an October presidential election but the latest violence is bound to raise concern about security for a September parliamentary election, particularly in the south and east.

The United States has lost more than 100 military personnel since deploying troops to Afghanistan following the ousting of the Taliban. Most deaths have been in accidents.

Four U.S. soldiers were killed on March 26 when their vehicle struck a land mine in the southeast of the country.