Bombers kill 71 in Afghan attacks

TWO separate suicide and gun attacks on police and soldiers in Afghanistan left at least 71 dead and nearly 170 wounded yesterday in the latest devastating assaults on beleaguered security forces.

The Taliban claimed the more deadly of the two assaults, a coordinated attack on police in the southeast city of Gardez in Paktia province.

That assault killed 41 people and injured 158, according to the interior ministry, and left hospital officials calling for blood donations. There were desperate scenes as relatives queued for news of loved ones after the hours-long battle.

A separate ambush blamed on the Taliban in the neighbouring province of Ghazni killed 25 security officials and five civilians with 10 wounded, the interior ministry said.

Afghanistan’s army and police, on the front line against the Taliban since foreign combat forces pulled back in December 2014, have suffered shocking casualties over the past year. Their ranks are beset by corruption and desertion.

Doctors and nurses rushed to attend to the wounded women, children and police filling the corridors where some bodies also lay. Outside, university students formed a queue to donate blood, an AFP photographer said.

The attack, claimed by the Taliban in a tweet, began when two suicide bombers driving an explosives-laden truck and a Humvee blew them up near the training centre, which is close to the Paktia police headquarters.

The blasts flattened a building and enabled gunmen to force their way inside the compound, according to officials and the interior ministry.

A university student who was in class at the time said he heard “a big boom” which shook the building and shattered windows.

“As we were trying to find our way [out of the building] I heard a second blast and then the dust and dirt covered us in the class. Several of my classmates were wounded by broken glass,” Noor Ahmad told AFP.

The battle between the attackers, armed with guns and suicide vests, and security forces lasted around five hours before it ended with all five militants killed, officials said.

Photos posted on Twitter showed two large plumes of smoke rising above the city.

The second attack, in Ghazni some 100 kilometres west of Gardez, followed a similar pattern involving insurgents detonating an explosives-laden Humvee near a police headquarters then storming the building, Haref Noori, the Ghazni governor’s spokesman, told AFP.