Officials have confirmed an exchange of fire involving British Paratroopers in Kabul took place at the same time civilians said they were shot at while trying to take a pregnant woman to hospital.
A 20-year-old man was found shot to death near the scene of the shooting, which happened early Saturday, the International Peacekeeping Force said.
The peacekeepers said an investigation was underway but insisted the British paratroopers involved in the shooting were fired on first.
Both parties - the civilians and the peacekeepers - said the shooting occurred at about 1.20 a.m. in a hillside slum facing an abandoned grain silo which the troops were using as an observation post.
The civilians said between 1 a.m. and 1.30 a.m. yesterday they tried to take a 21-year-old woman named Faria to the hospital to give birth.
In the group, they said, were the woman's husband, 25-year-old Mohammed Isaq, his 20-year-old brother Amaun, who was killed, the woman's mother-in-law and a neighbour who was driving the car.
"They started shooting after the car engine started and the lights were turned on," said Mohammed Din, an uncle of the slain man, who was present when the shooting started.
He said Amaun died instantly and the driver was wounded.
Captain Graham Dunlop, a spokesman for the British-led force, said a six-man British patrol fired shots only after they themselves had been shot at. "The soldiers identified the firing point and they returned fire," he said.
Dunlop said that at daylight, searchers found a car that had been damaged by gunfire, and in a nearby house they found a 20-year-old man who had died of a gunshot wound to the head.
PA