Afghan service for murdered aid worker

Murdered British aid worker Karen Woo was remembered at a service in Afghanistan yesterday.

The 36-year-old was killed alongside nine colleagues on August 5 as they returned from delivering medical supplies to poor mountain communities.

Friends and fellow staff gathered for a ceremony to lay a plaque in her memory in the British Cemetery in the Afghan capital Kabul.

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Dr Woo, from Stevenage, Hertfordshire, was due to fly back to Britain within days to marry her fiance Paddy Smith, a security consultant based in Afghanistan.

Mr Smith has said he plans to return to Britain with her remains.

The service came as hundreds of mourners gathered in Scotland for the funeral of a soldier who died as he tried to rescue a wounded comrade in Afghanistan.

Lance Corporal Stephen Monkhouse, from Greenock, Inverclyde, was killed by enemy fire in the Lashkar Gah district of Helmand province on July 21.

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The 28-year-old who served with 1st Battalion Scots Guards died alongside Wakefield soldier Corporal Matthew Stenton from The Royal Dragoon Guards as the pair tried to rescue a colleague who had been shot.

Friends and family paid tribute to the member of the Pipes and Drums in a service at St Andrew's Roman Catholic Church, in Greenock where he lived with his mother Linda Watt, 49.

Major Iain Gwynne, of the Scots Guards, said: "Stephen was one of the finest. He lived life to the full. He just was a fantastic guy. Stephen did what we would hope every other soldier would do for us: He died trying to save others."