Kabul suicide bomb kills 13 troops, civilian workers (Reuters)

KABUL (Reuters) – A suicide car bomber on Saturday killed 13 troops and civilian employees of the NATO-led force in Kabul, including Americans and a Canadian, in the deadliest single ground attack against the coalition in 10 years of war in Afghanistan.

"Five International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) service members and eight ISAF civilian employees died following a suicide vehicle-born improvised explosive device attack in Kabul earlier today," ISAF said in a statement.

A Canadian military spokesman said one of the dead was a Canadian soldier. The Pentagon said earlier all 13 of the ISAF fatalities were American. But after the Canadian death was reported, a Pentagon spokesman said Americans were among the dead but that authorities were checking the identities of those killed.

Three other civilians and a police officer were also killed in the attack on a convoy of military vehicles, a spokesman for the Afghan Interior Ministry said.

Lethal attacks are relatively rare in the heavily guarded capital, Kabul, compared with the south and east of Afghanistan, but Saturday's killings came less than two months after insurgents launched a 20-hour assault on the U.S. Embassy in the capital.

The assault on the ISAF convoy took place late in the morning in the Darulaman area in the west of the city, near the national museum.

The former royal palace, now in ruins, is also in the area, along with several government departments and Afghan and foreign military bases.

The Taliban later claimed responsibility for the attack, saying it packed a four-wheel-drive vehicle with 700 kg (1,500 pounds) of explosives.

SECURITY HANDOVER

The attack is likely to heighten worries about the reach of insurgent forces as the United States and its allies prepare to hand over responsibility for security to Afghan forces by 2014.

"We are confident we can undertake the transition," NATO's senior civilian representative in Afghanistan, Simon Gass, said at a meeting in Kabul on Saturday before the attack. "If we compare the security situation to how it was two years ago, we can see very dramatic improvements in many areas."

In two other attacks on Saturday, three Australians and an Afghan linguist were killed in Uruzgan province in southern Afghanistan when an attacker wearing an Afghan National Army uniform opened fire on them, authorities in neighboring Kandahar province said.

In Kunar province, east of Kabul, a teenage female suicide bomber killed herself and wounded several National Directorate of Security members in an attack on the NDS building.

ISAF commander General John Allen condemned the attacks in a statement later on Saturday, as did the U.S. Embassy in Kabul.

"Our common enemy continues to employ suicide attackers to kill innocent Afghan fathers, mothers, sons and daughters, as well as the Coalition forces who have volunteered to protect them," Allen said in a statement.

A spokesman for U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said the Pentagon chief was determined the United States would continue its "aggressive pursuit of the enemy."

Violence across Afghanistan is at its worst since the start of the war 10 years ago, according to the United Nations, despite the presence of more than 130,000 foreign troops.

ISAF says there has recently been a fall in attacks by insurgents, but that data exclude attacks that kill only civilians and attacks on Afghan security forces operating without international troops.

On Thursday, insurgents armed with rifles and rocket-propelled grenades attacked two bases used by foreign troops in southern Afghanistan. An Afghan interpreter working for ISAF was killed in that attack, which stretched into Friday before the last of the four insurgents were killed.

There has been a series of high-profile assassinations, as well as day-to-day attacks by Taliban raiders, over the past year.

More than a dozen people were killed in the September attack on the U.S. Embassy and ISAF headquarters.

(Reporting by Christine Kearney; Writing and additional reporting by Daniel Magnowski in Kabul, Susan Cornwell in Washington and Janet Guttsman in Toronto; Editing by Peter Cooney)

View the original article here

Afghan peace council head killed in Kabul (Reuters)

KABUL (Reuters) – A Taliban suicide bomber on Tuesday killed former Afghan President Burhanuddin Rabbani and head of a council tasked with trying to negotiate a political end to the war, in what analysts called a blow to peace efforts.

The killing underscored doubts over the ability of fledgling Afghan security forces to protect even the most prominent politicians as U.S.-led forces ready to pull out by 2014.

"A Taliban member who went to Rabbani's house (in the heavily guarded diplomatic enclave) for peace talks detonated a bomb hidden in his turban," a statement by the Kabul police chief's office said.

President Barack Obama called the killing of Rabbani, head of Afghanistan's High Peace Council, a tragic loss but said work needed to continue to bring elements of Afghan society together to end the years of violence.

A police source said Masoom Stanekzai, a senior adviser to President Hamid Karzai, was badly injured in the attack.

It was the highest profile assassination in Afghanistan since the younger half-brother of President Hamid Karzai, Ahmad Wali Karzai, was killed at his home in July by a highly trusted family security guard.

It also came just a week after a deadly 20-hour siege by militants in the fortified capital, which illustrated the strength of the Taliban after nearly a decade of war.

"The killing of Rabbani is a serious blow against President Karzai and the government's peace and reconciliations efforts. It also underscores the inability of the government to protect even the most prominent Afghan politicians," one diplomat said.

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid claimed responsibility, saying that the killer had gone to Rabbani's home for talks.

"As soon as Rabbani came three steps forward to hug Mohammad Masoom, he triggered his explosive-filled jacket killing Rabbani, (another) Taliban militant Wahid Yar and four security guards present at the house," he told Reuters.

Commander of the International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan, General John R. Allen, called the killing "another outrageous indicator that, regardless of what Taliban leadership outside the country say, they do not want peace, but rather war."

"WILL NOT DETER US"

President Karzai, at the start of talks with Obama on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly, said Rabbani's death "will not deter us" from continuing the quest for peace.

Karzai, meeting Obama for the first time since the U.S. president announced a troop drawdown plan earlier this year, planned to cut short his New York visit to return home.

"It is a tragic loss," Obama said with Karzai at his side. "We both believe that despite this incident, we will not be deterred from creating a path whereby Afghans can live in freedom, safety and security and prosperity."

"It is going to be important to continue the efforts to bring all of the elements in Afghanistan society together to end the senseless cycle of violence," he said.

Rabbani, a former leader of a powerful mujahideen party during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s, was chosen last October by Karzai to head the High Peace Council.

His plan included offering amnesty and jobs to Taliban foot soldiers and asylum in third countries to leaders.

The assassination comes after a series of suicide bombings and other major attacks believed to be the work of the Haqqani network, a Taliban-allied insurgent faction based along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border.

One analyst said the peace council had not been seen as effective and that Rabbani himself was viewed by many as an impediment to a deal because he was so loathed by the Taliban.

"But, his assassination might mean that the networks Rabbani led or influenced within Afghanistan .... may resist a deal with the Taliban even more," said Caroline Wadhams, a security expert at the Center for American Progress in Washington.

"It could make it that much more difficult to get greater buy-in from key Afghan leaders, who have been deeply skeptical of talks with the Taliban for some time."

Vali Nasr, a former senior official in the State Department's Afghanistan/Pakistan office, said: "The Taliban wants to send a very powerful message that the Karzai government is not in charge."

"That is important because people begin to waver and shift their allegiances ... And it makes it very difficult to say the Taliban is serious about negotiations if they keep killing people they should be negotiating with," Nasr said.

Rabbani served as president in the 1990s when mujahideen factions waged war for control of the country after the Soviet withdrawal.

As a leading figure among Tajiks, the second largest ethnic group in Afghanistan, there were also concerns his death could worsen ethnic tensions.

The assassination comes a week after a 20-hour gun and grenade attack on Kabul's diplomatic enclave by insurgents, and three suicide bomb attacks on other parts of the city -- together the longest-lasting and most wide-ranging assault on the city.

Last week's siege was the third major attack on the Afghan capital since June.

All three of those attacks are believed to be the work of the Haqqani network, a Taliban-allied insurgent faction, based along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border.

(Additional reporting by Emma Graham-Harrison in Kabul, Laura MacInnis in New York, and Missy Ryan in Washington, Writing by Jonathan Thatcher; Editing by Sugita Katyal)

View the original article here

US: Kabul attack a propaganda win for Taliban (AP)

By HEIDI VOGT and AMIR SHAH, Associated Press Heidi Vogt And Amir Shah, Associated Press – 1?hr?48?mins?ago

KABUL, Afghanistan – The commander of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan on Wednesday acknowledged the Taliban gained a propaganda victory in a 20-hour assault focused on the U.S. Embassy, which left 27 police, civilians and insurgents dead. But he insisted the attack was not a sign of vulnerability in the Afghan capital.

Still, the sophistication and vehemence of the attack, in which insurgents fired rockets into the U.S. Embassy compound from a nearby unfinished high-rise where they may have stored heavy weapons ahead of time, raised fresh doubts about the Afghans' ability to secure their nation as U.S. and other foreign troops begin to withdraw. Afghan forces have nominally been in control of security in the capital since 2008 — but it took heavy involvement by U.S. and NATO forces to route out the latest attackers.

And spectacular attacks in the well-protected capital have become more common. This week's strike was the third deadly attack in Kabul since late June.

The Taliban claimed responsibility for the assault. Kabul's deputy police chief said it was likely the Pakistan-based Haqqani network carried it on behalf of the extremist group. U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker also blamed the Haqqanis, who have emerged as one of the biggest threats to Afghanistan's stability, working from safe areas across the border in Pakistan's tribal region.

It took 20 hours through the night for Afghan, U.S. and NATO troops to root out six insurgents holed up in the 12-story building on the Abdul Haq traffic circle, pounding them with barrages from attack helicopters as police and soldiers worked their way up floor by floor. From their roost, the insurgents had clear shots on the nearby U.S. Embassy and a nearby NATO compound, battling Afghan forces in a gunfight that lit up the night with tracer fire.

At 9:30 a.m. Wednesday, the Afghan Interior Ministry announced that the final holdouts had been killed. Police could be seen clapping their hands in celebration on the building's roof, while others carried the mangled bodies of six insurgents down flights of rough concrete stairs and piled them into the back of a waiting ambulance.

Eleven Afghan civilians were killed in the battle, more than half of them children, along with five Afghan police officers, said U.S. Marine Corps Gen. John Allen, the top commander of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan. Besides the insurgents in the building, four other attackers served as suicide bombers in coordinated attacks in several areas of Kabul — three of them killed by police before they could detonate their explosives.

Allen said that the attack had no impact on operations and did not mean that Afghan security forces weren't doing their job, arguing that many more potential attacks have been thwarted. However, he said it gave a propaganda victory to the Taliban.

"I'll grant that they did get an IO (Information Operations) win," Allen told reporters in the capital. NATO's senior civilian representative, Simon Gass, called the attack "an extremely frightening even for the citizens of Kabul."

Both these men and Crocker, the U.S. ambassador, argued that the insurgents are depending on headline-getting attacks because they can't actually take and hold ground. But in Kabul, the fear expressed by some residents showed the effectiveness of the current campaign.

Thirty-six-year-old Ghulam Sadeq, who works in a government office, said he doesn't trust the government or the security forces to keep him safe.

"It's true that the security forces were able to defeat attackers and prevent more casualties, but why couldn't they keep them from entering the city? Basically they are unable to stop them, or the insurgents have people helping them," Sadeq said.

Key questions were how the attackers managed to get their heavy arsenal so close to the embassy — into a building that Afghan and U.S. officials had long recognized was a potential platform for an attack. It appeared likely that either weaponry had been stored in the building ahead of time or that some insurgents had entered in advance with a supply of guns and ammunition.

A team of six police officers had been charged to guard the building — a 12-story concrete structure that looks like it was destined to become office space or a shopping center but where building had been halted for some time. Wahidullah Ahmad, a policeman who was overseeing the scene after the attack, said he did not know if any of those guards were among those killed.

One witness said the attackers were equipped with heavy machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and possibly a mortar. They also boasted an 82 mm recoiless rifle, a powerful weapon that usually fires shells designed to destroy tanks and is very heavy to carry, much less rush up a building's stairs in the heat of an assault.

The attack began after midday Tuesday when a minivan packed with insurgents was stopped at a checkpoint at Abdul Haq square, which is about 300 yards (meters) from the U.S. Embassy, according to U.S. and Afghan officials.

There were a series of large explosions starting around 1:30 p.m. At least one militant set off a suicide blast near the square. Others drove the vehicle into the partially constructed high-rise, which they took over.

Explosions shook the neighborhood as insurgents fired rockets from the building. Six or seven rockets hit inside the embassy compound during the fighting, and a rocket-propelled grenade that hit an embassy building wounded four Afghans. No NATO or U.S. Embassy employees were hurt.

There was a simultaneous barrage of explosions around the nearby Wazir Akbar Khan neighborhood, home to a number of other foreign missions. NATO and Afghan forces started to slowly move up floor by floor in an attempt to ferret out the fighters and U.S. helicopters provided fire from overhead.

The insurgents' Toyota minivan was rigged with explosives, and Afghan police spokesman Hashmat Stanekzai said it likely ferried the weapons. In the van, police also found burqas — the body and face-covering robe worn by many Afghan women in public — that the attackers likely used as diguises to get past police checkpoints, he said.

U.S. and NATO officials praised the Afghan forces for routing the enemy, but international troops played a major role.

AP photos show international troops inside the building throughout the clearing operation, apparently directing both the Afghan police alongside them and passing information to helicopters overhead.

Helicopter gunships took out three of the last four insurgent holdouts, said an Afghan police inspector at the site, Shafiqullah Ibrahim.

Crocker said the attack would not affect the transfer of security responsibilities from the U.S.-led military coalition to the Afghan security forces. Foreign forces are to completely withdraw their combat troops by the end of 2014.

He said it also underlines the problem of the safe havens that the Taliban's Haqqani allies enjoy in the lawless tribal areas over the border in Pakistan, including north Waziristan. Nearly all Taliban attacks in and around the capital have been carried out by the Haqqanis — including a weekend truck bombing in eastern Wardak province that wounded 77 U.S. soldiers.

"It's tough when you're trying to fight an insurgency that has a lot of support outside the national borders," Crocker said. "It's complicated, it's difficult but clearly for a long term solution those safe havens have to be reduced."

____

Associated Press writers Patrick Quinn and Rahim Faiez contributed to this report from Kabul.

View the original article here