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Afghanistan
Bomb kills 10 Afghans at dogfight
2011-02-28
[Al Arabiya] Two bomb kabooms on Sunday tore through a crowd of villagers watching a dogfight in the southern Afghanistan province of Kandahar, killing at least 10, officials said.

Zemarai Bashary, Afghan interior ministry front man in Kabul, told AFP the bombing in Arghandab district targeted villagers and a police vehicle, killing eight civilians and two police.

"There have been two kabooms, one at the middle of a gathering and the other on the side of the road nearby. Eight civilians have been killed, two cops have been killed," the front man said.

He said a dozen civilians and five police were maimed. He did not give details.
Shah Mohammad, the district chief of Arghandab, said the attack was aimed at villagers watching a dogfight.

"People had gathered to watch dog fighting. Two kabooms, from planted bombs, happened. Eight people, all civilians, have been killed," he told AFP.

The bombing follows a deadly Taliban-led campaign of blasts and suicide kabooms that have rocked Afghanistan in recent weeks and killed more than 100 people, mostly civilians, this month.

On February 20 nearly 40 people were killed in a gun and suicide kaboom by at least four Talibs on a bank in the eastern city of Jalalabad. That attack was the deadliest to hit the country since June last year.

Most of the recent attacks have targeted densely packed civilian areas.

Dog fighting is popular in southern Afghanistan, but the Taliban banned it as un-Islamic and Sunday's bombing was the latest attack to target people watching it.
Damn, I hate agreeing with the Taliban on anything, but if they've got to blow someone up, doing it to people who force cruelty on dogs is a good start.
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Afghanistan
Taliban attack kills two at Kabul mall
2011-02-15
[Bangla Daily Star] A Taliban jacket wallah targeted a popular shopping mall in the heart of the Afghan capital Kabul yesterday, killing two guards and wounding at least two other people, officials said.

Interior ministry front man Zemarai Bashary told AFP that the attacker went kaboom!" after he was stopped at the gates of the Kabul City Centre, Afghanistan's first modern-style indoor shopping complex that opened in 2005.

The blast is the second serious attack within three weeks against shops frequented by Westerners in the Afghan capital, highlighting the precarious state of security.
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Afghanistan
Afghan clashes end, troops reclaim base
2010-12-20
[Iran Press TV] Afghan authorities say a day-long shootout between gunnies and security forces in northern Afghanistan, which left several troops dead, has ended.

The deadly clash broke out earlier on Sunday following the seizure of an army recruiting center. Four armed gunnies wearing vests wired with explosives stormed the recruiting center in Konduz Province, killing eight security personnel.

"The fighting is over," Zemarai Bashary, an interior ministry front man told AFP in the capital, Kabul.

Security officials in Konduz say troops managed to kill two of the attackers while another pair occupied the facility throughout the day.

Bashary said the remaining two rebels had been bumped off by Afghan cops, but did not elaborate on the operation.

The victims included four coppers and four army soldiers.

In a separate attack, gunnies ambushed an army bus outside the country's main recruitment center on the outskirts of Kabul.

President Hamid Maybe I'll join the Taliban Karzai condemned the attack as "criminal," stressing that "the attacks were a major and unforgiving crime... [by] Afghanistan's enemies opposing the strengthening of Afghan cops."
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Afghanistan
Taliban suicide squad targets Afghan peace jirga
2010-06-04
Taliban suicide commandos on Wednesday attacked a huge gathering of Afghan leaders and notables hosted by President Hamid Karzai to seek consensus on how to end nearly nine years of war.

As Karzai addressed more than 1,600 delegates and Western diplomats at the peace jirga, rockets exploded and gunfire erupted near the huge air-conditioned tent in Kabul where the conference was taking place.

Officials said suicide bombers wearing explosive-packed vests and dressed in women's burqas targeted the event, which was being protected by 12,000 security personnel, but that the attack was unsuccessful.

"The area is under our control now and is cleared," Interior Ministry spokesman Zemarai Bashary told AFP. "Two attackers aged between 17 and 20 years had managed to come to the area using burqas and had entered a house under construction," he said, adding that a third would-be suicide attacker was taken into custody. At least five explosions, believed to be caused by rockets, interrupted the opening of the three-day jirga that Karzai hopes will achieve a consensus within the disparate country on how to end war with the Taliban.

The militia -- which is opposed to peace talks until all foreign troops have left Afghanistan -- claimed that it had dispatched four suicide bombers, who were armed with guns and rockets and threatening the jirga from a nearby rooftop. Karzai left the event on schedule after his address, travelling in his customary armoured convoy.

Delegates took a scheduled break for his departure, but did not return to their seats for about three hours, with some taking refuge beneath trees from the rocket attacks.
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Afghanistan
US flies Afghan troops to recapture mountain district from Taliban - Taliban mysteriously gone?
2010-06-01
U.S. helicopters flew Afghan troops into a remote district overrun by the Taliban and recaptured the main town Tuesday without firing a shot, military officials said.

The move comes ahead of a major conference in Kabul starting Wednesday where Afghan President Hamid Karzai will try to build consensus for peace overtures to the insurgents. The Taliban on Tuesday dismissed the conference as serving the interests of "foreign invaders."

A unit of about 200 elite Afghan troops landed in Barg-e-Matal district of Nuristan province before dawn in an assault backed by U.S. helicopters and a handful of American advisers, U.S. officers familiar with the operation told The Associated Press.

They recaptured the main town in the region without shooting and no one was harmed, NATO said in a statement, though the operation was expected to continue for a few days. Taliban fighters were believed to have left the town and may have taken positions elsewhere in the valley.

Government forces pulled out of the rugged, mountainous region last weekend after hundreds of Taliban fighters swept into the area from nearby Pakistan and fought for almost a week with Afghan troops and local residents, who have a reputation for fierce resistance to outsiders.

U.S. troops had established an outpost in Nuristan but abandoned it last October after eight American soldiers were killed in a fierce Taliban attack. Insurgent strength has grown in the region since, prompting fears that Taliban who have come under pressure from U.S. missile strikes and military operations in nearby Pakistan could be looking for a new haven.

The U.S. officers said Taliban fighters — mostly Afghans but also Pakistanis and a few Arabs — are thought to number about 500, spread out over an area of about 15 miles (25 kilometers) in a forested mountain valley.

Villagers reported that a senior Pakistani Taliban commander, Maluana Fazlullah, had been killed in fighting with Afghan troops in Nuristan last week, but officials have not been able to confirm it.

Nuristan is very isolated and far removed from the main battlefields in Afghanistan's south, with a small, scattered population and limited strategic value. But taking back Barg-e-Matal would be an important symbolic victory for the Afghan military, which is often criticized as ineffective. Washington also badly wants to hand more control of security to Afghan troops.

"This successful operation by Afghan forces will return governance to Barg-e-Matal," Interior Ministry spokesman Zemarai Bashary said in a statement Tuesday. "This operation shows the improved planning and operational capabilities of our joint forces in response to serious incidents even in the most remote locations of Afghanistan."

NATO airstrikes pounded the area Monday ahead of the operation, targeting a cave complex Taliban leaders were believed to use as a command center, said the U.S. officers, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the information was sensitive.

The airlifted Afghan troops were to join up with 400 Afghan security forces that withdrew from Barg-e-Matal but were still in the region.

Up to 1,500 civilians living in and around the main town had fled or been evacuated before the operation started.

Fighting also raged in other parts of the country.

About 180 Taliban attacked a police post Monday in the Purchaman district in southwestern Farah province, triggering hours of fighting that killed 15 insurgents, one police official and six villagers who joined the fight on the government side, said provincial police chief Mohammad Faqir Askar.

A NATO service member was killed Monday by a makeshift bomb in southern Afghanistan. No further details were being released, but the service member was not American, NATO said.

In an operation in Khost province on Pakistan's border, NATO and Afghan forces captured several commanders of the Haqqani group, a Pakistan-based Afghan Taliban faction with close ties to al-Qaida, a NATO statement said.

Meanwhile, a U.S. general took formal command of the bulk of British troops in Afghanistan as part of plans to streamline NATO operations in the south.

Marine Maj. Gen. Richard Mills took control of 8,000 British forces in Helmand and Nimroz provinces that will become part of a new command structure splitting southwestern provinces from those farther east, including Kandahar. A British officer remains in charge of U.K. forces in Kandahar, Daykundi, Uruzgan and Zabul provinces.

Military spokesman Maj. Gen. Gordon Messenger told the British Broadcasting Corp. the changes would make little difference to the troops on the ground.

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Afghanistan
Suicide Bomber Blows Himself Up in Kabul
2010-05-30
[Quqnoos] A suicide attacker blew himself up Saturday outside a military caterer in Kabul but caused no casualties, officials said

The explosion took place east of the capital, close to a warehouse and supermarket run by Supreme Food Services, supplier of food to the foreign military, ministry spokesman Zemarai Bashary told AFP.

"It was suicide attack and the suicide attacker detonated explosives strapped to his body," he said.

It was not immediately clear what the target of the attack had been, he said, adding the attacker, who was on foot, may have detonated prematurely.

The blast took place at the Kabul end of the road to Bagram air base, a huge NATO installation and until recently the biggest in the country, which is about 45 kilometres (30 miles) further north.

Two suicide bomb attacks in Kabul earlier this month ended a peaceful stretch in the capital of almost three months.
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Afghanistan
Taliban Kidnap District Police Chief
2010-01-24
[Quqnoos] Taliban militants attacked a police patrol in Kunar province Saturday, capturing a district police chief and two other officers. The patrol, which included Jamtullah Khan, the police chief of Shaigal district in Kunar province, was attacked after midnight, provincial Police Chief Khalilullah Ziayee told AFP.

"Taliban abducted the district police chief along with two other policemen," he said.

It is the first abduction of a police chief by militants, said Zemarai Bashary, a spokesman for the Afghan Interior Ministry.

Hundreds of Afghan businessmen, foreign journalists, politicians, aid and construction workers have been kidnapped in the past by militant groups or criminal gangs. Most of the abductions have criminal motives or are carried out in a bid to secure release of fellow fighters from Afghan jails.
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Afghanistan
Bomb explodes in Afghan capital, no injuries
2009-11-29
[Dawn] A bomb exploded in a trash can in the centre of the Afghan capital on Saturday causing little damage and no injuries, the Interior Ministry said.

Interior Ministry spokesman Zemarai Bashary described the device that exploded in the Wazir Akbar Khan embassy district as a 'sound bomb,' meaning it was designed to make a loud noise rather than cause any damage, Reuters reported.

A Reuters witness at the scene said there was some damage to a nearby wall but the impact looked small.

Wazir Akbar Khan, the capital's most secure district, is home to embassies and many foreign companies and has been hit by a number of bomb attacks in the past year.

Five days before the Aug. 20 presidential election, a suicide car bomb attack killed seven people. The Taliban claimed responsibility.

Violence in Afghanistan has escalated to record levels this year. US President Barack Obama is just days away from making an announcement on whether he will send tens of thousands more troops to the war-riven country to beat a growing Taliban insurgency.
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Afghanistan
Assailants on central Kabul bank killed
2009-08-20
Afghan security forces have killed three gunmen, who stormed a bank in Kabul, and are searching for more attackers who might have hidden inside the bank.

Explosions and gunfire could be heard from the building, just a few hundreds of meters from the presidential palace compound.

The area is close to a bazaar and about 1.5 kilometers (one mile) south of the city center, which was quiet with many businesses closed for a public holiday.

The attack comes as Taliban militants have vowed to disrupt the August 21 presidential election, which comes against a big increase in violence by the group ousted after the US invasion in 2001.

According to a Taliban spokesman, gunmen launched an attack on central Kabul on the eve of presidential elections. Police, however, said they were ordinary criminals escaping arrests.

A spokesman for the Taliban, Zabihullah Mujahed, claimed that four of the militants were in the building in a standoff with police that had left several dead.

"We do not know who they are. They could be criminals or terrorists," Interior Ministry spokesman Zemarai Bashary told Reuters. "Our operation is under way and we are trying to capture them alive."
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Afghanistan
Afghan truck blast claims childrens lives: Police
2009-07-10
[Al Arabiya Latest] An overturned truck rigged with explosives blew up near Kabul on Thursday, killing 25 people including many school students in one of the deadliest blasts this year in war-torn Afghanistan, police said.

Loaded with firewood, the truck overturned overnight about 30 kilometers (19 miles) south of the capital in Logar province and exploded as authorities were trying to remove the vehicle in the early morning, they said.

The attack comes as Western militaries boost their troop deployments to Afghanistan ahead of key presidential and provincial council elections scheduled for August 20. "In the explosion today 21 civilians and four policemen have been martyred," provincial police chief Ghulam Mustafa Mohsini told AFP.

School children dead
" The civilians include school students and male elders. Four others including three students and one civilian man have been wounded "
Ghulam Mustafa Mohsini, police
At least 13 of those killed were children from a nearby school, said Kamaluddin Zadran, a provincial official "The civilians include school students and male elders. Four others including three students and one civilian man have been wounded," he said.

The students were struck as they were going to area schools -- the first educates pupils aged nine to 12 years old and the second students aged between 16 and 18, locals said.

Some of the children who died in the explosion were believed to be aged 10 to 12 years. Police said some bodies were burned beyond recognition.

The interior ministry in Kabul gave the same death toll. "A total of 25 people have been killed and four are wounded including three children," ministry spokesman Zemarai Bashary told AFP. "Police went in the morning to see and open the road. As police arrived at the scene the truck exploded and unfortunately killed 21 civilians and four policemen."

The blast created a large crater in the ground and caused widespread damage, he said. It was not clear if the truck was headed to the capital to carry out an attack or had been intended to explode where it did, the official said. "We don't know at this stage. There was no driver in the morning with the truck. We are still investigating the issue," he said.

The governor of Mohammad Agha district, where the explosion took place, said 12 bodies were initially identified and that most of them were school students. "We are still trying to recover bodies from under the debris of collapsed shops. There are more people dead," said the official, Abdul Hameed Hamid.

" It seems that the explosives were remotely detonated as a crowd gathered around the truck in the morning "
Din Mohammad Darwish, govt spokesman
Hamid said it appeared the truck was deliberately overturned in time to explode as authorities arrived.

Three shops were totally destroyed and windows smashed up to one kilometer (half-mile) away from the explosion, he said. The blast took place on a main road from southern and eastern Afghanistan that heads into the capital Kabul. The truck was heading towards Kabul, said provincial government spokesman Din Mohammad Darwish. "It seems that the explosives were remotely detonated as a crowd gathered around the truck in the morning," he said.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack.
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Afghanistan
Day of violence in Afghanistan claims 51 lives
2009-06-03
Six members of an Afghan family and a US soldier were among at least 51 people killed in a surge of attacks across Afghanistan where troops are battling a Taliban insurgency, authorities said on Tuesday.

A suicide bomber destroyed a civilian vehicle about five kilometres from the country's largest US military base in the small town of Bagram, the Interior Ministry said. Six people from the same family were killed, including two children, it said in a statement. Another child was wounded, it said. "Two men, two women and two children are killed," Ministry spokesman Zemarai Bashary told AFP. "This is an act of insurgents," he said. A US soldier was killed and two wounded in a Taliban attack in the eastern province of Paktya, which borders Pakistan, the US military said. Paktya province spokesman, Rohullah Samoon, said an Afghan interpreter was killed in the same incident. A roadside bomb had hit a military vehicle, he said. Another roadside bomb struck a vehicle carrying private Afghan guards in the same province and killed eight of the men, he said.
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Afghanistan
Afghanistan: Deadly suicide blast north of capital
2009-05-27
[ADN Kronos] Three Afghan civilians and three foreign soldiers have been killed in a suicide car bomb attack north of the capital, Kabul, according to Afghan officials. The attack took place in Kapisa province, where United States and French troops are deployed as part of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF).

The explosive-laden car rammed into a military convoy in Sayat district. ISAF said the nationality of the soldiers had not yet been released.

Kapisa is a strategically important province, near the key Bagram air base and close to the Kabul-Jalalabad highway.

Afghan officials say the district is frequently used by militants to launch attacks in the capital.

The US military and an ISAF official said separately that the bomb had hit US troops.

Afghan interior ministry spokesman Zemarai Bashary said the target of the attack was a convoy of international forces.

The civilians were just passers-by and it was not yet clear who they were, Bashary said.

Five Taliban were killed in an overnight air strike by foreign forces in Ghazni province, southwest of Kabul, the provincial police chief said. International troops in Ghazni are under US command.

Eight militants were killed on Monday in clashes with Afghan police and US forces in Uruzgan province in southern Afghanistan, US forces said.

Three insurgents were also killed on Monday when a bomb they were planting exploded in southeastern Paktika province, the Afghan National Security Directorate said.

Violence in Afghanistan is expected to worsen in the coming months as some 21,000 additional US soldiers are deployed to reinforce NATO-led troops in the south and east of the country - the stronghold of the Taliban-led insurgency.

Last year was the deadliest in the conflict since US-led forces ousted the Taliban in 2001 and violence has risen to its highest-ever level in recent months.
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