Militants attack Indian consulate in Herat

Four attackers enter houses close to the consulate before dawn and start shooting in the compound.

HERAT:

A handful of heavily armed insurgents, including suicide bombers, attacked the Indian consulate in Herat hours before dawn on Friday.

Indian staff at the mission escaped soon after the shooting began at around 3 am.

Police said Afghan security forces had killed the attackers, who were holed up in buildings overlooking the consulate, following a firefight that lasted several hours.

Herat police chief General Samihullah Qatra said four attackers, including suicide bombers, had entered houses close to the consulate before dawn and began shooting into the compound.

“There were three suicide bombers. Our security forces killed all of them. Only five of our forces were wounded.”

“They fired a couple of RPG shots. It was dark and they couldn’t verify where it was coming from,” India’s ambassador to Kabul Amar Sinha said.

He said there had been around 10 staff resident at the consulate in Herat.

It was not immediately clear who was behind the attack and no one claimed responsibility.

Pakistan was the first to strongly condemn the attack, with the Foreign Office statement saying, “No cause justifies targeting of diplomatic missions. It is a matter of relief that no one from the Consulate staff was hurt.”

Afghan Interior Ministry Friday suspected “certain regional intelligence circles” to be behind the attack.

President Hamid Karzai described the attack as an assault on Afghanistan and India.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 24^th, 2014.