The United States has recovered the remains of two American service members killed in the crash of an air force plane in Afghanistan.

They were the only two people onboard the air force E-11A electronic surveillance aircraft when it went down on Monday in Ghazni province, a US defense official said on Tuesday.

The identities of the two have not been publicly announced, pending notification of their relatives.

A Taliban spokesman had claimed that the group shot the plane down over territory they control near Ghazni city.

But the official said there was no indication that the plane was downed by hostile action, and the American recovery team met no Taliban resistance in reaching the crash site.

The Taliban hold much of Ghazni province. Monday’s plane crash there is not expected to derail US-Taliban peace talks if the crash investigation determines, as expected, that it was not the result of hostile action.

The US and the Taliban are negotiating a reduction in hostilities or a ceasefire to allow the signing of a peace agreement that could bring home an estimated 13,000 American troops and open the way to a broader postwar deal for Afghans.

A journalist in the area, Tariq Ghazniwal, said on Monday that he saw the burning aircraft. He told the Associated Press that he saw two bodies and that the front of the aircraft was badly burned but its body and tail were hardly damaged.

The crash site is about 10km (6.2 miles) from a US military base, Ghazniwal said. Local Taliban were deployed to protect the crash site, he said.