Taliban steps up attacks on Afghan security forces

Suicide bomber kills NATO soldier in latest incident

KABUL, Afghanistan — A Taliban suicide bomber disguised as a woman rammed his motorcycle into an international convoy, killing a NATO soldier and two Afghan civilians in an attack north of the Afghan capital, the U.S. military said Friday.

It was the second deadly assault this week on a NATO convoy.

Stepped-up Taliban attacks this week have focused mostly on the country’s south, but there was also a deadly bombing in the western city of Herat, where 32 people died in a militant assault on a Shiite mosque.

Taliban takes credit

Thursday evening’s attack hit the NATO patrol near the town of Qarabagh, barely 18 miles north of Kabul, the Afghan capital, the U.S. military said.

The day before, a suicide attacker hit a convoy on the edge of the southern city of Kandahar, killing two U.S. soldiers and wounding another four.

Both attacks were claimed by the Taliban.

According to the U.S. military, three other Georgian soldiers were wounded in Thursday’s bombing, as well as two U.S. service members and an Afghan interpreter.

The military said the wounded are in stable condition receiving treatment at the U.S. military hospital at Bagram Air Base, also north of Kabul.

The district governor in Qarabagh, Abdul Sami Sharifi, said the attacker concealed his explosives beneath the all-enveloping women’s garment known as a burqa.

He rammed his motorcycle into the NATO patrol, setting off his explosives, Sharifi said.

In a statement, U.S. Gen. John Nicholson, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, praised the contribution of the nearly 900 Georgian military personnel serving in Afghanistan.

“The commitment of Georgia as our largest non-NATO contributor is vital to our mission and we are honored to stand beside them under these difficult circumstances,” Nicholson said.

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said Friday that one of its fighters from the Takhar province carried out the attack at 8 p.m. in Qarabagh.

He claimed 11 Americans were killed, but the insurgents routinely exaggerate their claims.

Market stormed

Meanwhile, in southern Helmand province, the Taliban stormed a market Friday in the Gareshk district and fired at a nearby police station, according to district police chief Ismail Khan Khopalwaq.

The market was closed because of the Muslim weekend, and no casualties were reported.

In recent days, the Taliban have stepped up their attacks on Afghan security forces across the country’s south.

A Taliban attack early Friday on a police outpost in southern Zabul province, on the border with Pakistan, killed four policemen.

And three policemen were killed on Thursday when the Taliban attacked an outpost in southern Kandahar province, police spokesman Zia Durrani said.