Suicide bomber kills six near police checkpoint in Afghan capital

HERAT, AFGHANISTAN: A suicide bomber blew himself up in the Afghan capital of Kabul on Monday, killing at least six people near a police checkpoint, including policemen, officials said, but no militant group has yet claimed responsibility. Six people were killed in the explosion, said Najib Danish, a spokesman for the interior ministry.

Ten policemen and civilians, including women, were injured in the blast. The attacker on foot detonated his suicide vest close to the
checkpoint near a school in central Kabul, which is in the same
area as the finance and justice ministries and close to the
presidential palace. Police spokesman Basir Mujahid said he was about 20 m (66 ft) away from the blast, near where a demonstration had broken up some 30 minutes before.

"I took four bodies away but there were more on the ground,"
he said, without giving further details. The attack came as hundreds of demonstrators gathered in Kabul to protest against the government's failure to prevent attacks by Taliban militants in two provinces.


Afghan security forces suffered scores of casualties in heavy fighting,
officials said on Monday, as Taliban militants step up battlefield pressure while seeking a political settlement with the United States. About 50 security forces personnel were killed in attacks late on Sunday by Taliban fighters on checkposts around the southwestern city of Farah and nearby districts that triggered hours of fighting, regional officials said.

At the same time, about 25 Afghan commandos were killed in
the central province of Ghazni, where the Taliban have been
battling militia from the mainly Hazara community in the
districts of Malistan and Jaghori, a conflict coloured by hostility between ethnic Hazaras and Pashtuns.



"Fresh troops have been sent to Malistan and Jaghori but the
people are also cooperating and have stood up against the
insurgents," Army General Chief of Staff, Mohammad Sharif
Yaftali, told reporters. Some commandos had been killed or wounded, he added, but gave no details.

US commanders have said they expect the Taliban to step up
military efforts to secure the best possible position while they maintain contacts with US special envoy Zalmay Khalilzad aimed at opening peace negotiations. Khalilzad, an Afghan-born former US ambassador to Kabul, met President Ashraf Ghani and other officials at the weekend, in his latest round of meetings following an initial meeting last month with Taliban officials in Qatar.



But Sunday's fighting underscores the pressure on Afghanistan's overstretched security forces, suffering from their highest level of casualties ever, estimates from the NATO-led Resolute Support mission show. The government no longer releases exact casualty figures but officials say at least 500 men are being killed each month and hundreds more wounded, a tally many consider an underestimate.

Ghazni, briefly overrun by the Taliban in August, sits on
the highway linking Kabul, the capital, to the major southern
city of Kandahar. It is also a gateway into the mountainous
central provinces of Hazarajat, home mainly to Hazara people. Security officials said heavy fighting in Malistan took a major toll of commandos unfamiliar with the terrain after they came under Taliban attack. The Ghazni fighting prompted demonstrations in Kabul and Ghazni by Hazaras demanding more government help.

Late on Sunday, Taliban fighters also attacked Farah city as
well as checkpoints in the nearby districts of Khaki Safed and
Bala Buluk, said Shah Mahmood Rahimi, deputy head of the Farah
Provincial Council. He said 45 Afghan local police were killed in the fighting, along with five soldiers.



Local police spokesman Mohibullah Mohib confirmed attacks on
several security checkposts, adding that a Taliban commander and
five of his fighters were killed but said he had no information
on casualties. Remote and sparsely populated Farah, criss-crossed by
smuggling routes into neighbouring Iran, is under heavy pressure
from the Taliban, who control much of the countryside and who
briefly overran the city in May.