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UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs 04 July 2006

AFGHANISTAN: Five civilians killed in Kunar province

KABUL, 4 Jul 2006 (IRIN) - Suspected Taliban guerillas killed five Afghan civilians working at a US military base in the eastern province of Kunar province late on Monday, while in the capital Kabul two separate bombs left six people wounded.

“Insurgents opened fire on a truck on Monday evening carrying labourers working in a US military base in Korangal village in the Dara-e-Pech district of Kunar province killing five of them and wounding another,” Zahidullah Zahid, spokesman for the Kunar governor, told IRIN.

Zahid said the labourers were driving home from work when armed militants stopped the vehicle and fired on them.

In a separate incident in the capital, a bomb apparently placed in a handcart went off at a busy traffic intersection, wounding five civilians and shattering windows at a cinema and the nearby justice ministry, said Ali Shah Paktiawal, head of the criminal department of Kabul police headquarters.

The explosion was just 200 m away from the presidential palace.

In another incident also early on Tuesday, an interior ministry official was wounded in the eighth precinct of Kabul city when a remote-control bomb exploded near a bus carrying government officials to work, according to Paktiawal.

Afghan officials have repeatedly blamed Taliban insurgents for such attacks. The Taliban were toppled by US-led coalition forces in late 2001. Most were not killed or captured and fled to neighbouring Pakistan. The radical Islamic movement has since regrouped and is now waging a deadly insurgency against the government and US-led coalition forces, mainly in the south.

More than 1,100 people, including nearly 50 foreign troops, have lost their lives in insurgency-related violence in 2006.

The attacks coincide with the deployment of some 3,500 British troops in the volatile south of the country trying to help bring security and stability in parts of the country where the government remains weak.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair said on Tuesday that UK commanders in Afghanistan, who are facing a worsening security situation, may request more resources.

Blair said the government was ready to send additional troops, equipment or resources to support the British mission in the southern part of the country, where five British soldiers have been killed in the past three weeks.

Meanwhile, officials at the Afghan defence ministry have said that more than 200 militants have been killed since the largest anti-Taliban operation - Operation Mountain Thrust - involving some 10,000 soldiers from Afghan, British, Canadian and US forces - was launched in mid-May to curb the growing Taliban-led insurgency.

Taliban-led violence has raised concerns about the future of Afghanistan's fragile stability and democracy.

[ENDS]

This material comes to you via IRIN, a UN humanitarian information unit, but may not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations or its agencies. If you re-print, copy, archive or re-post this item, please retain this credit and disclaimer. Quotations or extracts should include attribution to the original sources. All materials copyright © UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs 2006