A British soldier has been killed during an operation to rescue an Afghan police officer in southern Afghanistan.

The governor of Helmand province says armed insurgents kidnapped the officer at a police checkpoint in the Nar-e-Seraj district late Sunday.

NATO and Afghan officials said Monday that British forces freed the abducted policeman, but the insurgents managed to escape.

A British soldier was killed and another wounded during the rescue operation.

Helmand's governor issued a statement saying he and local residents “will never forget such a sacrifice” by the British troops and offered condolences to the British government.

International forces are in the process of withdrawing and transferring security responsibility to their Afghan counterparts before the end of 2014, when all foreign combat troops are set to leave Afghanistan.

NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said Monday that Afghan army and police are taking the lead for the security of 75 percent of the Afghan population. He told reporters in Brussels that more than 330,000 Afghan security personnel are trained and “ready to keep their country secure” and that 18 Afghan army battalions and 65 police units have been certified as capable of operating independently, with NATO advisors.

Rasmussen also said that NATO has reached deals with the Central Asian nation of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan, allowing the coalition to remove military equipment and vehicles through their territories as it winds down the Afghan war. The NATO secretary-general said Monday “these agreements will give us a range of new options and the robust and flexible transport network we need.”