the people of afghanistan. i fully support secretary pi. gregg: conner powell is streaming live from afghanistan with more. reporter: gregg, afghan government says 16 civilians were killed today including nine children and three women. there are also several men that were killed and several others that were injured. apparently about 3:00 a.m. in the morning, a u.s. soldier walked off the base in district kandahar, afghanistan with his rifle and went about 500 meters to the nearest village. he then begin kicking down doors and shooting afghan civilians. he had gone into as many three different homes and begin shooting. he then after he was done, went back to his base and was arrested by afghans and u.s. forces at that base.
protesters and who are asking for i.d., want to know what you re doing there. then you get in the square. but that said, there are an awful lot of people who ve gone through that and who are in the square. but as far as the army s overall role, we just don t know. we have heard that these are fairly elite units fairly close to the president that are in the streets of cairo. whether they would feel proper in rolling out more military units at this point is a question mark. because, the army s being embraced by the people, and if it came to push and shove would the army move against the people? at this point it s not clear that they would. they might move against the people who were ordering them. so all of that is up in the air right now. christopher dickey on the scene in tahrir square. thank you for that update. and there s breaking news to tell you about from afghanistan. a suicide bomber blew himself up inside a customs office in the southern kandahar province, killing at least on
immense problems facing u.s. and nato forces. the taliban and can pakistan blowing up vital trucks bound for pakistan. one major campaign under way right now is the taliban birthplace of southern kandahar province. the taliban vowed to defend this area, regardless of the cost. a key strategic issue for the coalition is the fact that the taliban s press eps is felt over vast parts of the country. in some areas, they re much stronger than in others. critics argue that a key turning point in the war occurred very early on when the u.s. invaded, there were no american troops in iran. that invasion didn t happen until two years later. this graphic gives you an idea of what happens next. when the u.s. did invade iraq in 2003, the bush administration
officials complain the pakistani government is not doing enough to stop these raids. there has been fierce fighting and mounting casualties, i should say. as this graphic shows you, 100,215 have been killed in that war. fighting in the taliban right now are about 1,000 american troops and some 20,000 nato troops from 46 countries. these pictures serve as good examples of the immense problems facing iran and nato forces. they re blowing up the trucks bound for afghanistan. pakistan closed a major border crossing point and has given no indication when it will reopen. one major campaign is in the taliban birthplace of the southern kandahar province. the taliban threatened to defend this area despite the cost.
[ female announcer ] multigrain pops with pringles. all right. i m going to show just talking about the taliban s level of control of afghanistan. they ve expanded the control. 2007, the next one, this area here shows you the area that was of heavy taliban province. in the southern kandahar province and other areas. this is what the taliban largely controlled. area in green is what they had substantial presence in. this area in blue is really what they didn t control and only 8%