An American C-130 transport plane has crashed at Jalalabad airport in Afghanistan, killing six crew members and five civilian contractors, a US militaryspokesman said on Thursday.

“The crew and passengers were killed,” US Army Colonel Brian Tribus said.

The Taliban claimed it shot the Hercules aircraft down, according to Agence France-Presse.

“Our mujahideen have shot down a four-engine US aircraft in Jalalabad,” Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said on Twitter. “Based on credible information 15 invading forces and a number of puppet troops were killed.”

The Taliban are known to make exaggerated battlefield claims, and the US military has so far not given details on the cause of the crash.

US officials said only that there were no reports of enemy fire at the time and that the incident at about midnight local time on Thursday (1930 GMT) was under investigation.

A statement from the 455th Air Expeditionary Wing at Bagram airfield described it as “an accident,” without offering details.

The contractors had been working for “Resolute Support,” the NATO-led training mission.

The crash came hours after Afghan troops recaptured the center of the strategic northern city of Kunduz on Thursday amid fierce clashes with Taliban militants, three days after losing the provincial capital.

The Taliban have been fighting to regain power since being toppled by a U.S.-led intervention in 2001.

The number of US deaths in Afghanistan has fallen sharply after the United States wrapped up its formal combat mission last year, although US special forces and aircraft were involved in this week’s counter-offensive in Kunduz.

In 2011, Taliban militants shot down a U.S. military Chinook helicopter, killing all 38 people on board.

(The Guardian)