[Quqnoos] Afghan official announced Monday the arrest of nine would-be suicide bombers who were allegedly plotting attacks on "strategic targets" in Kabul. The men, aged between 16 and 55, were arrested during a coordinated operation that included raids on at least one Madrassa in the capital, a spokesman for the country's Intelligence Agency said.
"They were planning attacks on strategic targets but since the investigation is ongoing we cannot go into details," Sayed Ansari, spokesman for the National Directorate for Security (NDS), told reporters.
Some of the men were Pakistani nationals, he said, adding that weapons found during the raids -- including heavy machine-guns, rocket launchers, hand grenades and suicide vests -- had been brought over the border.
He did not give a specific date for the arrests, but said they were recent and occurred two or three days ahead of the planned attacks.
Kabul has been free of major attacks since late February when militants armed with guns and suicide vests killed about a dozen people, many of them foreigners.
More detail, from Dawn
Afghan security forces arrested nine members of a terrorist cell and seized nearly a quarter-ton of explosives, foiling a plot to stage suicide bombings and other attacks in Kabul, the country's intelligence service said Monday.
The arrests mark the second time in recent weeks that the security services claim to have prevented major attacks on the capital, a result they say of better training and use of informants.
Intelligence service spokesman Saeed Ansari said four of the suspects were arrested while traveling in a vehicle in the city's eastern district, while five others were picked up at an Islamic school in Kabul.
He said security forces also confiscated six rifles, two machine guns, two rocket-propelled grenades, 440 pounds (200 kilograms) of explosives, six suicide bomb vests and a vehicle. The dates of the arrests were not disclosed.
The suspects, one of whom was a Pakistani citizen, ranged in age from 16 to 55 and had been given specific responsibilities within the group such as for arranging accommodation or transporting arms, Ansari said. Three militants from the group were identified as would-be suicide bombers, although Ansari said the cell possessed enough explosives and vests to equip up to six suicide attackers.
He said the group was acting under orders from a Pakistan-based Taliban faction, which had rented a house in eastern Kabul, shipped weapons across the border and provided funds for the purchase of a vehicle to be used in suicide attacks.
The arrests follow the interception of a vehicle on April 8 on the outskirts of Kabul carrying what police said were five would-be suicide bombers on their way to carry out a major attack in the city - the largest such team ever detained in the capital.
Police said at the time that the bombers were sent by an Al-Qaeda-linked insurgent group based in Pakistan, and their capture follows widespread rumors that militants were planning attacks in the diplomatic quarter of Kabul.
The last major attack within Kabul took place Feb. 26 when suicide bombers struck two small hotels in the center of the city, killing at least 16 people, including six Indians. Afghan authorities blamed the attack on Lashkar-e-Taiba, the same Pakistan-based Islamist militia that India blames for the 2008 Mumbai terrorist attacks that killed 166 people.
Also Monday, Afghanistan's defense ministry said an explosion, possibly involving land mines or mortars, killed one Afghan army soldier and wounded three during a military training exercise in Kabul.
The Taliban said the blast was a suicide attack, though the insurgents have been known to make false or exaggerated claims.
In the north of the country, Afghan and international forces were continuing an offensive to drive the Taliban away from population centers and a key supply route.
As of Sunday, at least 29 militants, including two commanders, had been killed over four days of intense fighting, the Interior Ministry said.
In the southern province of Kandahar, a bomb planted on a donkey exploded near a police checkpoint, killing a 15-year-old boy Monday and wounding two police officers and two civilians, said Zalmai Ayubi, spokesman for the Kandahar provincial governor.
The target of the blast was not immediately clear, although it went off some about 2,000 feet (600 meters) from offices belonging to the United Nations.
Nato also said a combined Afghan and international force killed a number of suspected insurgents during a search for a senior Taliban commander in Ghazni province south of the capital. Troops were fired on as they approached a residential compound in the Qarahbagh district, returning fire and killing an unspecified number of militants.
Fighting elsewhere in the country killed two other insurgents in the eastern province of Khost and one in Kandahar, Nato said.
Meanwhile, a magnitude 5.3 earthquake struck in mountains north of Afghanistan's capital early Monday, killing at least seven people and injuring 30, officials said.
The temblor hit in Samangan province, about halfway between Kabul and the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif, according to the province's deputy governor, Kulam Sakhi Baghlani.
Roads and communications are sparse in the area, and casualty reports take time to reach authorities. The quake was felt in Kabul as well as the neighboring countries of Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.
Baghlani said three districts of scattered mud-walled villages were affected, with more than 300 homes damaged and dozens of head of livestock killed. Landslides sparked by the quake had blocked roads, making even more arduous what was already an eight-hour drive along winding mountain trails from the provincial capital of Aybak |
[Quqnoos] The Afghan intelligence agency Tuesday blamed Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba for last week's attacks in Kabul.
[Quqnoos] Six suicide bombers entered the city of Gardiz in eastern Afghanistan that two of them exploded themselves killing three security forces, officials say 
Afghan police said on Thursday they killed a would-be suicide bomber disguised in a burqa after he ignored warning shots. 
Italy's government paid a ransom of £1 million to the Taleban to free an Italian photographer taken hostage in Afghanistan, an aid group has claimed. 
A prominent Taliban commander has been captured by NATO-led troops in southern Afghanistan. The militant leader, who has not yet been identified, was detained during a raid by NATO and Afghan troops on a compound in Helmand province, the alliance said on Wednesday. According to a NATO spokesman, the commander led insurgents in the volatile Panjwaii district of Kandahar province, said NATO spokesman Squadron Leader Dave Marsh. "This seizure of a Taliban commander once again shows that there is nowhere to hide for insurgent leaders," Marsh said. 
Afghan intelligence agents say they have arrested a leading spokesman for the Taleban near the Pakistan border. Intelligence service spokesman 
Afghanistans intelligence agency said on Tuesday it had arrested three men planning suicide attacks in Kabul, including two from a Pakistan-based cell run by the capitals Taliban-era deputy police chief. The two were seized this week while trying to enter the city from neighbouring Logar province, spokesman