3 top Afghan leaders killed in gunfire

TALIBAN ASSASSINATION ATTEMPT MISSES US COMMANDER IN DEADLY STRIKE

In one of the most devastating Taliban assassination strikes of the Afghan war, the entire top leadership of Kandahar province was wiped out yesterday in an attack that missed the top US commander, General Austin S. Miller.

The gunfire in the provincial governor’s compound in Kandahar City killed the region’s powerful police chief, General Abdul Raziq, as well as the provincial governor and intelligence chief, and wounded three Americans, Afghan officials said.

Agha Lalay Datagiri, the deputy governor of Kandahar, confirmed the deaths of Raziq, Governor Zalmai Wesa, and the province’s intelligence chief, General Abdul Momin. The US military released a statement confirming that Miller, who was in the compound at the time of the attack, was not hurt, and that three Americans had been wounded.

Other officials, however, said that the governor’s death was not confirmed, and that he might be wounded. There were also conflicting reports about General Nabi Elham, the police commander for the southern zone with responsibility for several provinces.

In a brief televised message, President Ashraf Ghani said that he had dispatched his intelligence chief and other senior officials to Kandahar to investigate the situation.

It was not clear if there had been more than one gunman, but he suggested that it could have been an insider attack, by a turncoat among the Afghan security personnel there. “It’s hard to know who opened fire, but it comes from security guards accompanying the officials,” Datagiri said. “It’s believed that one of the governor’s guards opened fire, but it is not yet confirmed.”

The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack, saying it had specifically been aimed at Raziq and Miller.

Coming just 48 hours before parliamentary elections, the loss of the Kandahar leadership casts a further shadow on a political season already marred by violence. One third of polling stations will not open because of security, and at least 10 candidates and dozens of their supporters have been killed.