Sunday, October 16, 2011

Afghan governor survives Taliban attack
By Sayed Salahuddin, Published: October 16
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KABUL – The governor for Afghanistan’s Paktia province escaped unhurt from a Taliban commando-style attack Sunday, his spokesman said, the latest strike of its kind in recent days by the insurgent guerrillas.

Juma Khan Hamdard was in a convoy of vehicles when three suicide bombers began firing at it outside his headquarters in the town of Gardez, the provincial capital of Paktia, near the border with Pakistan, Rohullah Samoon said.

One police officer and a civil servant were killed in the clash before the bombers were gunned down, he said. The insurgents were in a vehicle packed with explosives that went off during the clash outside the governor’s compound, adjacent to several other key government buildings. There were no casualties from the blast, but it caused some damage to the buildings, he added.

“The governor was the target, but thank God he survived,” Samoon said by phone.

Paktia police chief Abdul Ghafar Safi said the bombers carried assault rifles, a rocket launcher and hand grenades.

Having largely lost the ability to confront the highly equipped foreign and Afghan troops in recent years, the Taliban insurgents have increased commando-style raids in recent years.

The targets of such attacks have been Afghan government as well as Western military and civil installations in various key regions of the country where NATO-led troops are locked in a nearly decade-long conflict with the guerrillas.

A number of high-profile Afghan security and civil servants have been killed in some of the attacks.

On Saturday, five heavily armed Taliban fighters, including at least two suicide bombers tried to hit a NATO-run base of U.S. troops in a complex attack in Panjshir Valley, one of the few secure regions of Afghanistan. The attack, the first of its kind in the valley, was foiled and resulted in the deaths of two drivers supplying fuel for the base and the five assailants.

A day earlier, three police officers were killed when a suicide bomber blew himself up near a police checkpoint in a southern town near the border with Pakistan.

Salahuddin is a special correspondent.
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washingtonpost.com/world/afghan-governor-survives-taliban-attack/2011/10/16/gIQAN73HoL_story.html

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