Attacks in northern Afghanistan kill 11 police officers, district chief

Attacks kill 11 Afghan police, district chief

KABUL, Afghanistan — Militant attacks in once-calm northern Afghanistan killed at least 11 police officers and a government official whose car was hit by a remote-controlled bomb, officials said Sunday.

In the south, a combined NATO and Afghan patrol killed a senior Taliban commander and a dozen other insurgents who were discovered planting a homemade bomb on a road, the alliance said.

Insurgents as well as coalition forces have escalated attacks across the country in recent months, as the NATO-led force pours in 30,000 more U.S. troops to make a new push to break the Taliban’s hold in their strongholds and establish stable Afghan governance.

International and Afghan commandos have been conducting near-nightly raids to capture or kill insurgents, while the Taliban have launched attacks on army bases and local officials and planted thousands of roadside bombs.

Insurgents in Kunduz province overran a checkpoint near the northern border with Tajikistan on Saturday, killing at least six of the nine border police stationed there, provincial deputy police chief Abdul Rahman Aqtash said.

Some reports said the guards were poisoned before the attack to make it easier for the insurgents, said Mahbobullah Sayedi, a spokesman for the provincial government. He said three border police stationed at the checkpoint were missing.

“It is possible that the militants used one of the border police, someone who was working there,” Sayedi said. “We don’t know anything about the three others, where they are. So that is why we are sending a delegation to find out exactly what happened.”

Aqtash set off Sunday morning for the site of the attack, but was forced to turn back when another gunbattle on the road to the border made it unsafe to travel, he said by telephone.

Northern Afghanistan was once relatively calm, but Taliban and other militants have become increasingly active in the past two years.

Also in Kunduz on Saturday, militants killed the chief of Qala Zal district by remotely detonating a bomb as he passed in his car, killing him and his bodyguard, the Ministry of Interior said.

Five other police died Saturday when their vehicle hit a roadside bomb in northeastern Badakshan province, which is next to Kunduz, the ministry said in a statement.

Two German soldiers were also wounded in Kunduz on Saturday when their convoy hit two roadside bombs within an hour. The same patrol also fought off a small-arms attack from insurgents in the same area.

Insurgents have been targeting police and other officials to undermine the Afghan government and sow fear. Establishing security and trust in local authorities is a key to the NATO counterinsurgency strategy to defeat the Taliban and eventually allow international troops to withdraw.

Ministry of Interior spokesman Zemeri Bashary said Sunday that 23 Afghan policemen have been killed and 69 others wounded in attacks across the country in the past week.

The NATO force said Sunday that it killed Malauwi Shahbuddin, a Taliban commander responsible for bringing foreign jihadists into the country to fight, and several other militants in the southern province of Zabul.

A joint Afghan-international patrol discovered and attacked the heavily armed insurgents as they were planting a roadside bomb in Shah Joy district on Saturday night, a coalition statement said. It said there were no coalition or civilian casualties.

A provincial spokesman, Mohammad Jan Rasoolyar, said 13 Taliban were killed in the attack.

The U.S.-led force has been increasing aerial surveillance across the country trying to detect laying of roadside bombs and then sending troops or airstrikes to stop them.

The makeshift bombs are among the deadliest weapons of the war, with several exploding each day.