Afghanistan ? Afghanistan’s surging violence left three Canadian soldiers and 21 suspected Taliban militants dead Wednesday.

The Canadian troops died when their vehicle was struck by a roadside bomb while on a supply mission between two checkpoints in Kandahar’s Panjwayi district, said Brig. Gen. Tim Grant, the head of Canadian forces in the country.

The latest deaths brought to 60 the number of Canadian troops killed in Afghanistan since deploying as part of the NATO-led force in 2002.

NATO and Afghan troops, meanwhile, clashed with militants in the same province and called in airstrikes, killing 21 suspected fighters, local mayor Khairudin Achakzai said. The militants’ bodies were strewn in the battlefield along with their weapons and ammunition, he said.

Violence this year has killed more than 2,400 people, mostly militants, according to an Associated Press count of figures from Afghan and Western military officials.