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Afghanistan

6 Nato Troops Gunned Down In Afghanistan Were Americans

2010-11-29

An Afghan border police officer opened fire on NATO troops during a training mission in the east of the country Monday, killing six NATO service members before he was shot dead, NATO and Afghan officials said. A U.S. official who spoke on condition of anonymity told AFP that the victims were Americans. The official did not provide additional details. The shooting -- the highest toll for NATO forces since nine Americans died in a Sept. 21 helicopter crash -- was the latest in a series of shootouts in which Afghan security forces have turned on their NATO partners. The attack also highlights the potential hazards of a push to speedily expand Afghanistan's army and police forces in the next few years. The goal is to turn over the responsibility for nationwide security to Afghan forces by 2014 so that NATO troops can go home. The shooter was wearing an Afghan border police uniform, NATO said, but did not provide additional details on how the shooting happened or his identity. A spokesman for the Afghan Interior Ministry, Zemeri Bashary, confirmed that the gunman was a border police officer, rather than an insurgent who had donned the uniform to infiltrate government forces.

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Afghanistan

Afghan arrested in airplane disturbance

2010-05-11

An Afghan man was arrested after boarding a passenger plane with a knife and trying to kick open a window while the plane was airborne, the Interior Ministry said Monday. Nobody was hurt in the incident Sunday on an Ariana Afghan Airlines flight from Kabul to Mashhad, Iran, said Zemeri Bashary, a spokesman for the Interior Ministry. Security forces on the national carrier's plane subdued the man quickly and he was arrested when the pilot made a scheduled landing in the southern city of Kandahar, Bashary said. The plane then continued to its destination in Iran. It was not immediately clear how many people were on board. Authorities were still questioning the man and had not yet determined a motive. Latifullah Taslaim, the airline's deputy director, confirmed the incident but said the man did not board the plane with a knife. The reason behind the discrepancy with the Interior Ministry's account was not immediately clear.

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Afghanistan

29 Taliban die in north Afghanistan fighting

2010-04-19

At least 29 militants, including two commanders, were killed over four days of intense fighting aimed at protecting supply routes through northern Afghanistan, the Interior Ministry said on Sunday. An Afghan policeman was also killed during mine clearance operations in the southern province of Kandahar, the Interior Ministry said. Afghan and international forces launched an offensive last week in the northern province of Baghlan to push the Taliban out of a number of districts, including the outskirts of the provincial capital, about 190 kilometers north of Kabul. Insurgents had stepped up attacks in the formerly calm province as part of efforts to disrupt a key northern overland supply route for international forces. NATO air strikes bombarded insurgent positions, killing 29 and injuring 52, said Zemeri Bashary, spokesman for the Interior Ministry. At least three Afghan police and four German soldiers have been killed in the fighting. Bashary said the operation was continuing on Sunday. Also on Sunday, a foreign soldier was killed by a roadside bomb in the most volatile part of Afghanistan.

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India-Pakistan

Â'Pakistan agrees to hand over Baradar to Afghanistan'

2010-02-25

[The News (Pak) Top Stories] A top Taliban leader picked up in Pakistan as part of a recent crackdown on insurgents will be handed over to Afghanistan, an Afghan government official said on Wednesday. "If Mulla Baradar has committed any crime inside Pakistan, he will be first tried in Pakistan." Islamabad said, however, that it had received no formal request to turn him over and that he could be tried first in Pakistan. Mulla Abdul Ghani Baradar is one of at least three Afghan Taliban commanders, who have been captured in recent weeks in Pakistan Pakistan has agreed to transfer Baradar to Afghan custody, according to Zemeri Bashary, a spokesman for Afghan Interior Minister Hanif Atmar, who was in Islamabad meeting with FBI and Pakistani officials. "Pakistan has agreed to hand Mulla Baradar over, but there is going to be consultations with judicial authorities," he said. Interior Minister Rehman Malik said Islamabad was expecting a formal request from the Afghan government to hand over Baradar, but the ministry issued a statement saying that no transfer was imminent. "Pakistan will make legal scrutiny and also investigate the criminal acts done by Mulla Baradar, including his illegal entry into Pakistan," the statement said. "If Mulla Baradar has committed any crime inside Pakistan, he will be first tried in Pakistan."

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Afghanistan

Nato attack killed civilians in Laghman: Afghan govt

2009-12-09

[Dawn] Nato forces killed civilians during an overnight strike on militants in eastern Afghanistan, the Afghan government said. Nato said only militants were killed. Interior Ministry spokesman Zemeri Bashary said that a number of civilians were killed when Nato forces went after a Taliban operative in Laghman province. Regional officials said 12 Afghans were killed in Tuesday's pre-dawn strike, including some civilians. No one provided an exact number of how many civilians died. Nato said in a statement that seven militants were killed and four detained the strike, which targeted a militant leader who had been responsible for several suicide attacks in the region. Hundreds of residents took to the streets to protest the incident. Bashary said an investigation was under way.

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Afghanistan

Afghanistan: Suicide bombers attack government building

2009-04-02

[ADN Kronos] Four suicide bombers dressed in army uniforms and armed with rifles attacked a government building in Afghanistan's southern city of Kandahar on Wednesday. The initial death toll was 10 people, including the four bombers, while 16 other people were were reported to have been injured. In a coordinated attack, the suicide bombers struck shortly after one of them detonated a car laden with explosives outside the offices of the consultative provincial council, as members of the council were holding a meeting with local elders. Two of the bombers were shot dead by police officers before they could detonate their explosives. However, a third militant managed to detonate his explosives, killing himself. Five of the victims were civilians and one was a police officer, said Afghanistan interior ministry spokesman Zemeri Bashary. No militant group initially claimed responsibility for the attack. Afghan and NATO-led troops have cordoned off the area. Kandahar, a former Taliban stronghold is Afghanistan's third largest city. The latest attack come as thousands of new US troops are due to arrive in the country.

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Afghanistan

Aid Worker Killed in Drive-By Shooting in Afghanistan

2008-10-21

Two gunmen killed a female foreign aid worker in Kabul on Monday in an unusual drive-by shooting that heightened fears over the worsening security situation in and around the Afghan capital. Witnesses and Afghan security officials said the incident occurred about 8 a.m. when two gunmen on a motorcycle drove up to the woman as she walked to work in the Kart-e-Char neighborhood of Kabul and opened fire with automatic weapons. The rapid-fire shooting left the woman crumpled on a sidewalk in front of a residential compound frequented by foreigners, witnesses said. Zemeri Bashary, a spokesman for the Afghan Ministry of Interior, identified the woman as a South African citizen who worked with an international aid organization focused on helping the disabled. Bashary said she had lived in the neighborhood where she was killed for at least several months. A Taliban spokesman claimed responsibility for the attack, saying the woman had been targeted because she worked for a Christian aid organization. "This woman came to Afghanistan to teach Christianity to the people of Afghanistan. Our leaders issued a decree to kill this woman," Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid told the Associated Press.

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Afghanistan

Car bomb kills 37 Afghan civilians

2008-02-18

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - A suicide car bomber targeting a Canadian military convoy killed 37 civilians at a busy market in southern Afghanistan on Monday, officials said. At least 30 were wounded, said Interior Ministry spokesman Zemeri Bashary. Three Canadian soldiers were among the wounded, said Kandahar Gov. Asadullah Khalid. The Taliban claimed responsibility for the latest attack in Spin Boldak, a town in Kandahar province near the border with Pakistan. It was the second major attack in as many days in Kandahar province, the former stronghold of the hardline Taliban. The death toll from a suicide bombing outside Kandahar city on Sunday rose to more than 100, making it Afghanistan's deadliest bombing since the fall of the Taliban in 2001. Though the Afghan-Pakistan border had been closed Monday because of elections in Pakistan, some of the wounded were taken to a hospital in Chaman, Pakistan just across the border for treatment. "A white Toyota Corolla car rammed the second vehicle in the convoy as it passed through the bazaar," said Hakim, who witnessed the attack from his grocery store. "Then there was a huge explosion. It was dust. I do not know what happened to me."

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Afghanistan

7 killed, 29 wounded in Afghan suicide blast

2007-10-14

A suicide bomber on a motorbike detonated his explosives in a crowded marketplace near Afghan police Saturday, killing seven people and wounding 29, officials said. The blast, near the border with Pakistan, killed two police and five civilians in the city of Spin Boldak in the southern province of Kandahar, said Zemeri Bashary, the Interior Ministry spokesman. Such attacks against Afghan police have become a trademark of Taliban suicide bombers. More than 600 police have been killed in insurgency-related violence this year, the Interior Ministry has said. Violence has killed more than 5,200 people this year, according to an Associated Press count based on official figures, the deadliest year since the fall of the Taliban in 2001.

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Afghanistan

Taliban Navy Loses Troop Transport

2007-06-02

Boat filled with Taliban sinks; 60 dead KABUL, Afghanistan - A boat crossing a river in Afghanistan's most dangerous province sank on Saturday, and at least 60 people were killed, including Taliban militants, the Defense Ministry said. Overloaded? Poorly maintained? Ran into a large piece of descending ordnance? 'Work accident'? while crossing the Helmand River, which snakes through Helmand province, the world's leading opium poppy region and site of fierce battles the last several months. Hundreds of Taliban insurgents are believed to be in Helmand. The Afghan army was investigating to see how many Taliban insurgents and how many civilians were on board, the ministry said. Why would civilians be traveling on the same riverboat with 'insurgents'? Because they are the 'camp followers' - the Taliban equivalent of the logistical 'tail', and as such are not truly civilians. The only other answer is they were human shields. Holy men needs lots of camp followers. Keeps them holy, and besides, they can wash the turbans. Elsewhere, suspected Taliban militants attacked a local police commander's home, killing five of his family members and sparking a gunbattle with police that left 10 insurgents dead, an official said. The attack in the southeastern province of Ghazni killed the commander's wife, two sons and two nephews, ... Different tribes as well as different 'sides'? If so, what are the relative strengths of the tribes? ... said Interior Ministry spokesman Zemeri Bashary. The commander worked for Afghanistan's auxiliary police, a system of backup officers who supplement the country's regular police force. Taliban militants often target police and government officials. More than 1,900 people have been killed in insurgency-related violence in Afghanistan this year, according to an Associated Press count based on U.S., NATO and Afghan officials. Maybe only a couple of hundred people, and 1700 Taliban? At a rally in Pakistan, a man described as the Taliban's new top field commander ... If he's the 'field' commander, what's he doing in Pakistan? Getting up to speed ... ... vowed in an audiotaped message to liberate Afghanistan from "American slavery," said Abdul Sattar Chishti, the cleric who organized the event. Chishti said more than 12,000 people listened to the speech by the brother of Mullah Dadullah, the top Taliban commander who was killed in a U.S. operation last month in southern Afghanistan. Another missed opportunity of a target-rich envronment. He said Dadullah Mansoor vowed to avenge his brother's death and those of others killed while fighting U.S., NATO and Afghan forces. "The blood of my brother will never go waste. We will never forget his sacrifices, and the role of other martyrs. We will complete Dadullah's mission by expelling Americans and liberating Afghanistan," Chishti quoted Mansoor as saying. It was not immediately possible to verify Chishti's claims about the rally at Killi Nalai, a village about 45 miles west of Quetta near the Afghan border. Although pro-Taliban elders have held similar rallies in northwestern tribal regions, protests the size of the one organized in Killi Nalai are rare.

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Afghanistan

Taliban: Kidnapped translator killed

2007-04-08

The kidnapped translator for an Italian journalist was killed on Sunday in southern Afghanistan, a purported spokesman for the Taliban said. The report could not be independently confirmed. Ajmal Nashqbandi, a freelance journalist and translator, was kidnapped along with Daniele Mastrogiacomo, of Italian daily La Repubblica, and a driver in southern Helmand province on March 5. The driver was beheaded, and Mastrogiacomo was released March 19 in a much criticized swap for five Taliban militants. The Taliban made a similar demand in return for the release of Nashqbandi. "We asked for two Taliban commanders to be released in exchange for Ajmal Nashqbandi, but the government did not care for our demands, and today, at 3:05 p.m., we beheaded Ajmal in Garmsir district of Helmand province," said Shahabuddin Atal, who claimed to be a spokesman for the regional Taliban commander Mullah Dadullah. "When we demanded the exchange for the Italian journalist, the government released the prisoners, but for the Afghan journalist, the government did not care," Atal said, but his claim could not be independently verified. Interior Ministry spokesman Zemeri Bashary said that police have no evidence yet that Nashqbandi has been killed. Another Taliban spokesman who frequently speaks with the media, Qari Yousef Ahmadi, said he was not aware of the killing. Local Tolo television station also reported Atal's claim that Nashqbandi had been beheaded.

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Afghanistan

5 Afghan police killed in clash with US-led troops

2007-03-17

US-led coalition forces mistakenly killed five Afghan police in a clash in a southern province, the government said Friday. There was no immediate comment from the coalition. The police were manning a checkpoint in Gereshk district in Helmand province when the clash broke out around 7:00 p.m. (1430GMT) on Thursday, said Interior Ministry spokesman Zemeri Bashary. "Coalition forces mistakenly opened fire on police," Bashary said. "Unfortunately five policemen were killed."

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