A second US Navy sailor who went missing in a dangerous part of eastern Afghanistan was found dead and his body recovered, a senior US military official and Afghan officials said on Thursday.
The family of Petty Officer 3rd Class Jarod Newlove, a 25-year-old from the Seattle area, had been notified of his death, the US military official said on condition of anonymity, because he was not authorised to disclose the information.
Newlove and Petty Officer 2nd Class Justin McNeley went missing last Friday in Logar province.
NATO recovered the body of McNeley - a 30-year-old father of two from Wheatridge, Colorado - in the area on Sunday.
Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said on Thursday that two days ago the Taliban left the "body of a dead American soldier for the US forces" to recover.
The Taliban said McNeley was killed in a firefight and insurgents had captured Newlove. Mujahid offered no explanation for Newlove's death.
NATO officials have not offered an explanation as to why the two service members were in such a dangerous part of eastern Afghanistan.
The sailors were instructors at a counter-insurgency school for Afghan security forces, according to senior military officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case.
The school was headquartered in Kabul and had classrooms outside the capital, but they were never assigned anywhere near where McNeley's body was recovered, officials said.
Newlove was shot once in the head and twice in the torso, according to Logar provincial spokesman Din Mohammad Darwesh. He speculated Newlove may have been wounded in a shootout with the Taliban and died because there was no medical care available in the rugged mountain area.
Mohammad Rahim Amin, the local government chief in Baraki Barak district, also said coalition forces recovered a body about 5.30pm and flew it by helicopter to a coalition base in Logar province, about 60 kilometres away.
"The coalition told our criminal police director of the district that the body belonged to the foreign soldier they were looking for," Amin said.
In the capital Kabul, President Hamid Karzai urged his international partners on Thursday to take stronger action against terrorist sanctuaries outside of Afghanistan, telling reporters the international community "is here to fight terrorism, but there is danger elsewhere and they are not acting."
Karzai appeared to be referring to insurgent sanctuaries across the border in Pakistan, although he did not cite that country by name.
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