[ALMANAR.LB] At least 20 people were killed when a shootout broke out at a wedding party in northern Afghanistan, officials said Monday.Western bands have guitars or horns or something. In Afghanistan every band needs a rocket launcher.
The clash, which police blamed on quarrels between guests, erupted late Sunday in Deh Salah district in Baghlan.
The once-tranquil province has recently been plagued by growing insecurity as the Taliban insurgency spreads north from its southern and eastern strongholds.
"As a result of the festivities, 20 people were killed and 10 others were maimed," provincial police front man Jawed Basharat told AFP, adding that the incident appeared to be the result of a local dispute.
Armed men traded verbal barbs before the shootout broke out and the victims were all male guests at the wedding aged between 14 and 60, said district police chief Gulistan Qusani.
"A local security official had gun sex after the verbal exchange heated up... and then both sides started trading fire," Qusani told AFP, giving a higher corpse count of 21.
Baghlan police front man Sultan Mohammad Ebadi said an official delegation had been sent to the site -- a Tajik-dominated area that is largely unaffected by the Taliban insurgency -- to investigate the matter.