The serviceman from 3rd Battalion The Mercian Regiment (Staffords) died on a patrol with the Afghan National Army in the Nahr-e Saraj district of the troubled southern province of Helmand, it said.

The patrol deployed from a nearby base to meet with people who had recently re-occupied the Haji Tor Aga Kalay area in the province, said Task Force Helmand spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Tim Purbrick.

"The soldier was part of the protective cordon guarding the meeting when insurgents engaged them with small arms fire during which he was fatally wounded. Our thoughts and prayers are with his family and friends," Purbrick said.

His family have been informed, the statement said.

His death comes two days after two other British soldiers -- one from the Parachute Regiment and another from the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers -- were killed in Helmand.

Of the 374 British troops killed since operations in Afghanistan began in October 2001 at least 330 were killed through hostile action. Some 26 British troops have died this year.

Britain has about 9,500 troops in Afghanistan. Prime Minister David Cameron has said they will be withdrawn by 2015 once responsibility for security is handed over to Afghan forces.

The foreign ministry said in a statement the aircraft had attacked the the Ziarat post, 2.5 kilometres (1.5 miles) from the border with Afghanistan in Mohmand tribal region.

"Pakistan's serious concern over the air incursion has been conveyed to the US embassy in Islamabad," spokeswoman Tehmina Janjua said.

She said Islamabad had launched an inquiry, adding that the US and NATO were also investigating the incident.

The foreign ministry has not said when the incursion happened or if anyone was wounded or killed.

But a security official said: "At least two foreign fighter jets violated Pakistan's airspace on Friday and dropped six bombs near the post."

An intelligence official in the area and a local administration official confirmed the incident and said there were no reports of any deaths.

The Pakistani military often accuses NATO's ISAF force of violating Pakistan's airspace in the hunt for Taliban who launch attacks in Afghanistan before fleeing back across the border.

Pakistan temporarily shut the main land route for NATO supplies into Afghanistan last September after officials accused NATO of killing Pakistani troops in another cross-border attack.

The northwest region is being targeted by a record number of US drone strikes, the number of which has doubled in the last year, with more than 100 strikes killing over 670 people, according to an AFP tally.

Fifteen US drone strikes have now been reported in Pakistan's tribal belt since US commandos found and killed bin Laden in a unilateral airborne raid on the Pakistani garrison city of Abbottabad on May 2.

Relations between Pakistan and the US, wary at the best of times, deteriorated sharply over the raid, which humiliated the Pakistani military and invited allegations of incompetence and complicity.

Tajikistan upset by 'US invasion' video game
Dushanbe (AFP) June 17, 2011 - A videogame depicting a fictional US and Chinese invasion of Tajikistan to prevent an Islamist takeover has upset the Central Asian nation after apparently touching a raw nerve.

A member of parliament called the game creators on Friday "foes" with a "sick fantasy," as he urged parliament to ban sale of the videogame "Operation Flashpoint: Red River."

"This computer game is a result of sick fantasy by Tajikistan's foes, who dream that our country will remain in the abyss of constant conflicts," said Davlatali Davlatzoda, a member of the ruling People's Democratic Party.

"It is painful and horrible to watch how our villages and cities are being destroyed as a result of anti-extremist actions by the Chinese and the Americans," he said.

"Our country will have presidential elections in 2013 and I am deeply convinced that certain forces cannot calmly watch how they will take place," he said

According to the plot of the game released in Europe in April, the US forces spill over from the neighbouring Afghanistan to prevent Islamic militants from taking power in Tajikistan in 2013.

China's People's Liberation Army enters Tajikistan to battle American dominance, according to the fictional videogame plot.

In the 1990s after the fall of the Soviet Union, Tajikistan went through a civil war with Islamists, which claimed lives of hundred of thousands of people.

An impoverished ex-Soviet country, Tajikistan is a mostly mountainous nation of seven million people on the border with Afghanistan and western China.