The number of foreign troops killed in Afghanistan in 2010 neared 700 with two more confirmed on Saturday, by far the deadliest year of the war underscoring the renewed focus on when international forces will leave. The NATO-led International Security Assistance Force said one of its troops was killed by a roadside bomb in southern Afghanistan, the heartland of the Taliban, and another in an attack by insurgents in the volatile east. It gave no other details, including their nationalities. Those deaths took the 2010 toll to 699. A total of 521 foreign troops were killed in 2009, previously the worst year of the war, but operations against the Taliban-led insurgency have increased over the past 18 months. About 2,270 foreign troops have been killed since the war began, roughly two-thirds of them Americans. Afghan forces have suffered far more but exact casualty figures are not available. The deaths came two days after U.S. President Barack Obama released a review of his strategy in the increasingly unpopular war, and will be a sobering reminder of the high human toll that has made some of Obama's European allies waiver. Chancellor Angela Merkel made an unannounced visit to German troops serving in the north on Saturday. The war has created deep divisions in Germany, the third-largest contributor of foreign troops.
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