An Afghan police recruit opened fire on Spanish trainers early yesterday, killing two of them along with their interpreter, Spain’s interior minister said.
The recruit was subsequently shot and killed by Spanish officers who had been conducting a police training course at their base in Badghis Province, Spanish Interior Minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba said.
The officers were members of a paramilitary unit that falls under the command of Spain’s Ministry of Defense, whose spokesman in Madrid said the motive for the attack was unknown.
Afghan officials also reported the death of an Afghan police officer in an exchange with Spanish police in Badghis’ Qalay-I-Naw district, but said they were still investigating the incident.
Following the officer’s shooting, hundreds of area residents gathered at the gate to the Spanish camp, chanting and throwing stones before moving on to the provincial government offices, the Afghan officials said.
Meanwhile, US President Barack Obama’s deadline of July next year to start withdrawing US troops from Afghanistan has given Taliban insurgents hope they can prevail in the war, the US Marine commandant said on Tuesday.
However, General James Conway said the insurgents will be disappointed when they find that no major withdrawal is on the horizon among US forces deployed in the Taliban heartland of southern Afghanistan.
“In some ways, we think right now it’s probably giving our enemy sustenance,” Conway said of the July target date.
“We think that he may be saying to himself — in fact we’ve intercepted communications that say, ‘Hey, you know, we only have to hold out for so long.’”
Conway, who is just back from a visit to Afghanistan, said government army and police forces in key southern provinces will not be ready to take over from foreign troops for at least “a few years,” and that he had told his Marines to brace for a long fight.
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