The bomb attacks come just a day after 11 soldiers died in separate helicopter crashes.
Eight US troops were killed in bomb attacks in southern Afghanistan ahead of a run-off presidential election, the NATO-led alliance said, in the deadliest month for US troops since the start of the war eight years ago.
The mounting violence comes at a time when US President Barack Obama is weighing up his options on whether to send more troops to Afghanistan to fight a Taliban insurgency that is at its fiercest since 2001.
NATO-led forces said several troops were also wounded in "multiple complex [bomb] attacks" in the south, just a day after 11 US troops died in separate helicopter crashes in Afghanistan.
An Afghan civilian was killed and several service members were also wounded in these incidents, it said. No other details were immediately available.
Separately, the NATO force said it had recovered the remains of three civilian crew members and the wreckage of a plane missing since October 13 in the remote Nuristan province. It said hostile action was not believed to be the cause of the crash.
US-led efforts to stabilise the country have been further complicated by weeks of political tension over a presidential election marred by widespread fraud in favour of incumbent Hamid Karzai, forcing a second round set for November 7.
On Tuesday, Mr Karzai's camp said a run-off vote in the presidential election must take place even if his challenger Abdullah Abdullah quits the race.
Mr Karzai agreed to a run-off under severe international pressure last week after a UN-led fraud investigation annulled a huge chunk of his votes in the original August 20 election.
Fuelling talk that he might pull out from the race altogether, Dr Abdullah set out a range of conditions this week ahead of the vote. Mr Karzai immediately rejected the demands.
Waheed Omar, Mr Karzai's chief campaign spokesman, said the election must take place even if Dr Abdullah quits.
"We should not deprive the people from their right of voting and their right of citizenship," he said. "Whether or not President and Abdullah take part in the run-off or not should not result in depriving the people from what they want".
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UP to 20 Sri Lankan asylum-seekers were last night preparing to leave the Oceanic Viking as early as tomorrow, in the first signs of an end to the standoff that began almost four weeks ago.
While Australian authorities remained hopeful of persuading all 78 of the Tamils to leave the Customs ship tomorrow, when the Oceanic Viking's permission to remain in Indonesian waters ends, there were reports last night that up to 20 of them would submit to health and identity checks today before being taken ashore to the Tanjung Pinang detention centre.
Indonesian Foreign Ministry official Sujatmiko said tonight that, by today, "hopefully some of them are ready to be verified".
The break in the impasse came as Kevin Rudd insisted no protests or threats by protesters would divert him from his policy on border security, even as Australian authorities confirmed they had offered to give the 78 Sri Lankans preferential treatment if they left the Oceanic Viking.
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Speaking in New Delhi, Mr Rudd said he had not been briefed on the offer to the asylum-seekers but expected "normal resettlement processes consistent with the UNHCR" would apply.
A written offer guaranteeing resettlement was presented to the 78 boatpeople earlier this week.
Published under Department of Immigration letterhead and signed by Australian diplomat Jim O'Callaghan, it promised those already declared refugees would be resettled within four to six weeks.
Those whose claims were subsequently successful would be resettled within 12 weeks.
The letter does not promise a particular country but sources close to the negotiations said the bulk - if not all - would end up in Australia.
Immigration Minister Chris Evans acknowledged Australia would take a "sizeable amount of the load".
He denied that the offer - which would see declared refugees processed well within the 90 days that those on Christmas Island must wait - amounted to special treatment.
But he did acknowledge that other refugees detained in Indonesia often had to wait much longer for resettlement.