Taliban Breach an International Base, Killing at Least 7 By ALISSA J. RUBIN and SHARIFULLAH SAHAK Published: August 28, 2013 KABUL, Afghanistan — The Taliban breached an international military base in eastern Afghanistan on Wednesday, in a complex attack that left at least one Western soldier, four Afghan police officers, and two other Afghans dead, Western and Afghan officials said. The attack, on a Provincial Reconstruction Team base in Ghazni, was eventually stopped by Afghan and Western troops inside the base’s perimeter, and about seven insurgents were reported killed. The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack in a message sent by Zabiullah Mujahid, a spokesman. The attack started Wednesday afternoon when a truck bomb exploded at the southern entrance to the base, said Col. Assadullah Khan Ensafi, the deputy police chief in Ghazni. Officials said that Taliban gunmen were then able to get inside the base’s outer boundary — an increasingly rare occurrence as the Afghan security forces have become more adept at heading off bombing attacks. Afghans in the area said they saw plumes of smoke and heard shooting that appeared to be coming from inside. A spokesman for the International Security Assistance Force, Sgt. Peter Dean, said only that he could confirm that the attack had occurred around 4 p.m. and that multiple attackers had been involved. He said he did not yet have any information on casualties. The base, set up to support local government officials and development projects, is primarily staffed by Polish soldiers, but it also includes Afghan and American forces. News agencies reported that a spokesman for the Polish military said that seven Polish soldiers had been wounded in the attack. And military officials in Kabul said that at least three other Western service members were wounded, one of them seriously. Ghazni Province has remained one of the more violent areas of the country, and in recent weeks there has been an uptick in attacks there. A female member of Parliament, Freeba Ahmadi Kakar, was kidnapped there on Aug. 11, and at least two Polish soldiers have died there recently: one was killed Tuesday by an improvised explosive device, and another was killed in June, according to Poland’s Defense Ministry. Poland recently announced that it would reduce the number of its troops to 1,000, from 1,600, in October and then withdraw all its troops in 2014. At least 38 Polish soldiers have been killed in the war in Afghanistan, according to iCasualties.org, a Web site that tracks coalition deaths. The head of Ghazni’s public hospital, Zia Gul Spandi, said that six Afghans had been killed in the attack Wednesday, including four police officers, and that 34 people had been wounded, including 12 children. Colonel Ensafi said the Afghan Army and the police later discovered a truck in the area that was packed with explosives. Also on Wednesday, a suicide car bomb exploded in Lashkar Gah, the capital of the southern province of Helmand. The attack was apparently aimed at a convoy of Western soldiers, but it instead killed a woman and a child and wounded 15 others, according to a spokesman for the Helmand governor. A New York Times employee contributed reporting from Lashkar Gah, Afghanistan. A version of this article appears in print on August 29, 2013, on page A8 of the New York edition with the headline: Taliban Breach an International Base, Killing at Least 7...nytimes/2013/08/29/world/asia/taliban-breach-international-base-killing-at-least-6.html?_r=0 Connect With Us on Twitter Follow @nytimesworld for international breaking news and headlines. Twitter List: Reporters and Editors
Posted on: Sat, 31 Aug 2013 20:55:21 +0000
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