Taliban gun down Afghan government media chief

Dawa Khan Menapal, who used to slam the insurgents on social media, was shot near a mosque in Kabul

KABUL: The Taliban shot dead the head of the Afghan government’s media information centre on Friday near a mosque in Kabul, days after warning that they would target senior administration figures in retaliation for increased airstrikes.

The killing of one of the government’s leading voices follows another bloody day of fighting in Afghanistan as the war spills into the country’s capital for the first time in months. It also comes hours before the UN Security Council meets in New York to discuss the conflict.

“Unfortunately, the savage terrorists have committed a cowardly act once again and martyred a patriotic Afghan,” interior ministry spokesman Mirwais Stanikzai said of the death of Dawa Khan Menapal. Menapal was popular in Kabul’s media community, and known for slamming the Taliban on social media.

Former presidential spokesman Sediq Sediqqi said he was “utterly shocked and devastated”. “We lost another great soul,” he added.

The Taliban claimed responsibility for the death, with spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid sending a message to media saying “he was killed in a special attack carried out by mujahideen”.

The murder comes after the militants warned on Wednesday of more attacks targeting Afghan government leaders, a day after the defence minister Bismillah Mohammadi escaped an assassination attempt in a bomb-andgun attack.

The Afghan and US militaries have stepped up airstrikes in their fight against the insurgents in a string of cities, and the Taliban said Tuesday’s Kabul raid was their response.

Fighting in Afghanistan’s long-running conflict has intensified since May, when foreign forces began the final stage of a withdrawal due to be completed later this month.

The Taliban already control large portions of the countryside, and are now challenging government forces in several provincial capitals.

Government forces continue to hit Taliban positions with airstrikes and commando raids, and the defence ministry boasted on Friday of eliminating more than 400 insurgents in the past 24 hours. Even as Afghan officials claimed to be hitting the Taliban hard, security forces have yet to flush out the militants from provincial capitals they have already entered - with hundreds of thousands of civilians forced to flee in recent weeks.

Don’t trust the Taliban: Afghan envoy to China

Afghanistan’s envoy to China has questioned Taliban’s pledge to Beijing on not harbouring Islamist militants seeking to separate Xinjiang, saying the insurgent group cannot be trusted to keep its promises.

“I don’t think even China believes in that (the promise),” Javid Ahmad Qaem told Reuters in an interview in Beijing, adding that the Taliban were “only saying this to get regional support”.