International

Burqa Clad Taliban Bombers Attack Two Afghan Cities

Continuing to up violence scales, Burqa clad Taliban bombers attempted to storm government buildings and a military base in the Afghan cities of Gardez and Jalalabad on Tuesday, killing six people, officials said.

The attacks came ahead of presidential and provincial elections scheduled for August 20. President Hamid Karzai, who, in recent months has come in for severe criticism over the worsening security situation and corruption, will seek re-election during the polls.

Half-a-dozen armed bombers attempted to shoot their way into several government buildings in Gardez in Paktia province. The insurgents were, however, killed in retaliatory fire before they could reach their intended targets, say media reports attributing the information to provincial spokesman Rohullah Samoon.

Samoon confirmed that one of the bombers blew himself up in front of the intelligence department, three intelligence officers were killed in the explosion. The other bombers were killed by security forces. He added that two policemen were also killed.

Afghan defence ministry in Kabul later said two of the six bombers detonated their bombs and the rest were shot dead by security forces.

The ministry however did not number the casualties on its side while saying, “a number of security forces were killed and injured in the attack.”

Prohibitory orders were immediately clamped in Gardez but claime that the situation was under control. Army soldiers guarded the entry points into the city.

In Jalalabad, two bombers were killed in a shootout with police as they tried to fight their way into the city airport, a base for Afghan and foreign troops, say correspondents citing provincial spokesman Ahmad Zia Abdulzai.

At least one police officer was killed in the attack.

A report on the AFP website citing Zabihullah Mujahed — a Taliban spokesman — said the Islamist fighters was responsible for both attacks.

Mujahed said fifteen armed fighters had entered the governor’s compound and other government buildings in Gardez.

He further claimed that four of the Taliban fighters had infiltrated into the Jalalabad air base and killed several Afghan and foreign troops.

Show More

Related Articles

Back to top button

Adblock Detected

Please consider supporting us by disabling your ad blocker