Kabul - An investigation jointly conducted by Afghan and US military found that "a number of civilians" were killed in US-led airstrikes in western Afghanistan, but failed to say how many.

Afghan officials in Farah province said dozens of civilians were killed when US-led warplanes bombed several houses in Bala Boluk district of the province early this week.

"The joint investigation team confirms that a number of civilians were killed in the course of the fighting," a joint Afghan and US military statement said Saturday.

However it said that investigators were "unable to determine with certainty which of those casualties were Taliban fighters and which were non-combatants because those killed are all buried."

"The investigation team visited three grave sites containing seven individual graves and two mass graves with an indeterminate number of people buried in each mass grave," it said.

On Friday, a member of provincial council in Farah said that the villagers had recorded the name of 147 civilians who were killed in air and ground operation on Monday and Tuesday. The US military had rejected the figures, saying the numbers were "grossly exaggerated."

The Saturday statement said that the joint team found that large number militants, including non-Afghan fighters, had gone to Ganj Abad and Grani villages in the district and "deliberately forced villagers into houses" from where they attacked Afghan and coalition forces in the area.

"Following the fighting, Afghan officials also confirmed the Taliban fighters loaded two trucks with bodies and forced elders to parade them through villages to incite outrage among villagers, and then to proceed to the governor's house," it said.

The joint statement condemned "the brutality of the Taliban extremists deliberately targeting Afghan civilians and using them as human shields."

The joint investigators were still looking into the incident in the two villages in the district, the statement said.

A US military spokesman said Friday that a separate probe was ordered by President Hamid Karzai, the results of which have yet to be known. (dpa)