Four Canadian soldiers were killed by a roadside bomb in southern     Afghanistan in an attack claimed by the Taliban.

The Canadian troops travelling in a convoy were returning from a patrol in Gumbad village of Shah Wali Kot district, some 75 kilometres (45 miles) north of Kandahar city when the incident occurred, he said.

A self-styled spokesman for the remnants of the Taliban, Yousuf Ahmadi, claimed responsibility for the attack in a telephone call from an unknown location.

Canada deployed 2,300 troops in Kandahar in February and took command of the coalition forces in the southern province.

The incident takes the death toll of Canadian soldiers to 15 since the forces arrived in 2001 to join the hunt for Taliban and Al-Qaeda members.

The first Canadian soldier that died this year was killed in Helmand on March 29 along with a US soldier after the Taliban attacked a coalition base with mortars, rocket-propelled grenades and small arms.

Two Canadian soldiers died in Kandahar in March after their vehicle rolled off the main road. In addition, a Canadian diplomat was killed in January in a suicide bomb blast.

Eight other Canadian soldiers have died since the force arrived in 2001 to join the hunt for Taliban and Al-Qaeda members.

PHOTO CAPTION

Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan. (AFP)