The number of foreign troops killed in Afghanistan this year has reached at least 500, according to an independent monitoring site on Monday and a tally compiled by Reuters, compared with 521 in all of 2009.

The Nato-led International Security Assistance Force said an ISAF service member was killed in an insurgent attack in the east on Sunday.

There has been a sharp increase in foreign military deaths, many of them American, as foreign troops launch more operations to counter a growing Taliban-led insurgency.-Reuters