Afghan forces end siege near embassy
SIX KILLED AS TALIBAN STRIKES NEAR SPANISH MISSION; DEATH TOLL FROM KUNDUZ HOSPITAL ATTACK RISES TO 42
Afghan security forces suppressed a suicide attack on a guest house near the Spanish embassy in Kabul, killing three Taliban fighters after hours of intermittent gunfire and explosions that lasted into the early hours of yesterday.
A Spanish security officer was killed in the attack, in a heavily protected part of Kabul close to several embassies and government buildings, while five Afghan police were killed or wounded, Kabul police chief Abdul Rahman Rahimi said.
In addition, one Spanish citizen and nine Afghan civilians were wounded and another 47 Afghans and foreigners were rescued from nearby buildings where they were trapped as security forces sealed off the area around the guest house.
The latest in a series of attacks on foreign targets in Kabul began at about 6pm (1330 GMT) on Friday when a suicide attacker detonated a car bomb near the guest house, allowing three gunmen to take up positions and open fire on security forces.
“The operation took time because we wanted to rescue the people trapped in surrounding buildings and we had to move cautiously and in a proper tactical manner,” Rahimi told Reuters.
The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack, just days after President Ashraf Gani returned from a regional peace conference in Pakistan, where he sought support to revive peace talks that stalled this year.
It followed a separate Taliban attack on the airport complex in the southern city of Kandahar, in which at least 50 civilians and security forces personnel were killed.
Meanwhile, the death toll from a devastating US air strike on an Afghan hospital in October has risen to 42, medical charity MSF said yesterday, citing an internal probe as pressure grows for an international inquiry.
The October 3 bombing of the hospital in the northern city of Kunduz during a Taliban offensive forced the facility to close and sparked an avalanche of global condemnation.
The charity has said the raid by an AC-130 gunship lasted nearly an hour and left patients burning in their beds with some victims decapitated and suffering traumatic amputations.
“Previously MSF had reported a death toll of at least 30 people, but the organisation confirms the toll has risen to 42, after methodical review of MSF records and family claims, as well as patient, staff and family testimonies,” MSF said in a statement.
“The revised figures include 14 MSF staff members confirmed to have been killed, as well as 24 patients and four caretakers.”
The strike was “caused primarily by human error”, General John Campbell, the US commander in Afghanistan, said last month, prompting a strong rebuke from the charity who slammed American forces for “gross negligence”.