Kabul: A shoot-out with insurgents at Kabul's traffic-police
headquarters has come to an end.
Afghan authorities told RFE/RL that five insurgents were
involved in the deadly attack.
The fighting followed a coordinated assault involving a
suicide car bombing and insurgents with suicide-bombing vests.
Afghan Deputy Interior Minister Abdurrahman Rahman said
three insurgents entered the building, destroyed stairs leading to upper
floors, and gained access to a weapons storeroom.
After hours of fighting, security forces killed the
militants barricaded inside the building. Rahman told reporters that three
traffic-police officers were killed and 18 people were wounded.
The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack in a text
message to the media.
The four-story traffic-police department is located in the
west of the capital near several key police units and the parliament building.
"I was asleep when the explosion happened," said
Qandagha Jan, a Kabul resident.
"The explosion was so huge that all the windows of our
house broke. Our children were playing in the yard at the time."
NATO's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF)
spokesman Guenter Katz noted that militants increasingly target Afghan security
forces as the country prepares for the planned withdrawal of most foreign
troops by the end of 2014.
"The last two attacks we have seen were indeed against
Afghan government installations. [Whether] this is a trend, we don't
know," Katz said.
"This would be speculation, but it's very clear that
the more and more the Afghan security forces are getting into the lead, the more
they are targeted by the insurgents."
Speaking at a news conference in Kabul on January 21, Katz
said ISAF will continue to train, assist, and advise the Afghan security
forces.
Last week, a squad of six suicide bombers attacked the
Afghan intelligence agency headquarters in central Kabul.
That attack followed a failed assassination attempt on the
intelligence agency chief, Asadullah Khalid.
Copyright (c) 2013. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the
permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W.
Washington DC 20036.