Suicide bomber hits Italy's Afghan base
Source: Agencies |
May 31, 2011, Tuesday
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TALIBAN insurgents led by suicide bombers launched attacks on an Italian military base and near a government building in the main city in Afghanistan's west yesterday, killing four people and wounding dozens, officials said.
The bombers hit the center of Herat city, near a Transport Department building and bus stop, and outside the Italian-run base on the city's outskirts, Herat provincial police chief Sayed Aqa Saqib said.
The attacks were especially worrying because normally peaceful Herat, near the border with Iran, is one of seven areas where a gradual handover of security responsibility from foreign forces to Afghans will begin in July.
That handover is part of a process that will lead to all foreign combat troops leaving Afghanistan by the end of 2014. Some US lawmakers and analysts have questioned the wisdom of that timetable with violence still at such high levels.
Dawood Saba, the governor of Herat Province, said a suicide bomber in a small truck blew himself up at the entrance of the Italian-run base and that between two and four other attackers were still fighting from within a building nearby. Gunfire went on around the base for several hours but died down later yesterday.
The Taliban claimed responsibility for both bombings. Spokesman Qari Yousuf Ahmadi said four bombers had launched the attacks. He said the vehicle bomb that exploded in the centre of the city had also been meant to attack the Italian base but Afghan troops had intercepted it and the bomb went off early.
Another senior police official, Ghulam Farooq, said 37 people were wounded in the attacks. All those killed and wounded were civilians, he said. However, pictures taken at the base showed one serviceman in an Italian uniform bleeding from a head wound next to the rubble of a partially destroyed wall. Saqib said it appeared most of the dead and wounded were from the attack in the centre of the city.
Pictures taken outside the Italian-run base, which houses a joint civilian and military provincial reconstruction team, suggested the truck bomb had destroyed part of an outer wall, a gate and a guard post.
External damage was extensive, with rows of burnt-out bicycles and cars, and the windows of shops shattered for some distance. Ambulances took people to hospital. Italian troops form the bulk of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force in the area but there was no confirmation of casualties.
The bombers hit the center of Herat city, near a Transport Department building and bus stop, and outside the Italian-run base on the city's outskirts, Herat provincial police chief Sayed Aqa Saqib said.
The attacks were especially worrying because normally peaceful Herat, near the border with Iran, is one of seven areas where a gradual handover of security responsibility from foreign forces to Afghans will begin in July.
That handover is part of a process that will lead to all foreign combat troops leaving Afghanistan by the end of 2014. Some US lawmakers and analysts have questioned the wisdom of that timetable with violence still at such high levels.
Dawood Saba, the governor of Herat Province, said a suicide bomber in a small truck blew himself up at the entrance of the Italian-run base and that between two and four other attackers were still fighting from within a building nearby. Gunfire went on around the base for several hours but died down later yesterday.
The Taliban claimed responsibility for both bombings. Spokesman Qari Yousuf Ahmadi said four bombers had launched the attacks. He said the vehicle bomb that exploded in the centre of the city had also been meant to attack the Italian base but Afghan troops had intercepted it and the bomb went off early.
Another senior police official, Ghulam Farooq, said 37 people were wounded in the attacks. All those killed and wounded were civilians, he said. However, pictures taken at the base showed one serviceman in an Italian uniform bleeding from a head wound next to the rubble of a partially destroyed wall. Saqib said it appeared most of the dead and wounded were from the attack in the centre of the city.
Pictures taken outside the Italian-run base, which houses a joint civilian and military provincial reconstruction team, suggested the truck bomb had destroyed part of an outer wall, a gate and a guard post.
External damage was extensive, with rows of burnt-out bicycles and cars, and the windows of shops shattered for some distance. Ambulances took people to hospital. Italian troops form the bulk of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force in the area but there was no confirmation of casualties.
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