KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) - U.S.-led coalition forces killed several militants and a female civilian in an operation targeting two insurgent leaders in eastern Afghanistan, a military statement said Friday.

Meanwhile, hundreds of Afghans protested the alleged burning of a Quran at a remote U.S. military base. The coalition denied the allegation.

The U.S. and NATO-led forces have lost public goodwill by periodically causing civilian deaths in operations against insurgents since the ouster of the hard-line Taliban regime in 2001. They say they take all reasonable steps to avoid it.

The fighting happened in Zurmat district of Paktia province on Thursday. The coalition statement said it launched airstrikes after its forces came under fire as they searched compounds for two militant leaders believed behind attacks by foreign fighters on Afghan and coalition forces.

Several militants and a woman who was located in the same building the militants were firing from were killed, it said. One militant detonated a suicide-vest, killing himself.

Meanwhile, a suicide car bomber attacked a coalition convoy Friday in eastern Nangarhar province, but only the bomber died, said spokesman Lt. Nathan Perry.