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Seven die in Afghanistan suicide attack

A suicide attacker blew himself up in a northern Afghan city yesterday, killing seven people, including three German soldiers and wounding 17, the deputy provincial police chief said.

The attack happened in the center of Kunduz at approximately 10am, General Noor Mohammad Omarkhail said.

"We do know there was an attack in Kunduz and we do know there was some ISAF casualties, which means dead or wounded,'' NATO spokesman Major John Thomas said.

Omarkhail said two German soldiers and a translator were wounded. Four civilians were killed and 14 wounded in the blast.

Elsewhere, militants attacked US-led coalition and Afghan forces less than 120km northeast of Kabul, sparking a rare gunbattle close to the capital that killed an estimated 20 militants, officials said yesterday.

Afghan and allied forces were on combat patrol late on Friday in the al-Asay Valley in Kapisa Province, which borders Kabul Province, when they were ambushed, the coalition said.

The militants placed roadside bombs along the route in a "failed attempt to trap" coalition forces, a coalition statement said. Fighter aircraft fired on the militants, the statement said.

The coalition said that "several dozen enemy fighters were estimated killed" during the fight and that there were no reports of civilian casualties.

Kapisa Province Governor Abdul Satar Murad said about 20 fighters were killed and unconfirmed reports of civilian casualties.

While fighting in southern and eastern Afghanistan has picked up in recent weeks, battles so close to the capital are considerably rarer.

A joint US-Afghan operation in Kapisa in November was credited with scattering several hundred fighters who had gathered in the region's valleys and mountainous terrain and who threatened the capital and the nearby US base at Bagram.

That operation also busted a suicide cell that had launched several attacks in Kabul last fall.

The coalition, meanwhile, said about 20 Taliban fighters ambushed coalition soldiers and Afghan police patrolling near the Pakistan border in the eastern province of Paktia on Friday, sparking an eight-hour battle in which "a significant number of insurgents" were killed.

Troops called in airstrikes that destroyed "several enemy positions," the coalition said.

Deputy provincial police chief Ghulam Dastageer said the clash killed up to 60 fighters, though the only proof he offered was that officials found 60 abandoned weapons at the battle site.

He said it was possible there were Chechen, Arab and Pakistani fighters among the insurgents.
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