AFGHANISTAN: Taliban guerrillas have killed 10 policemen, including a provincial police chief, taking the death toll to more than 90 in one of Afghanistan's bloodiest weeks since US-led forces overthrew their strict Islamic regime in 2001.
Mr Abdul Khaliq, police chief of Logar province, and several other senior police officers from the province south of Kabul were among those killed in an ambush on Monday, Logar's military commander, Mr Fazlullah Mojadidi, said. He said the police chief had been returning from the funeral of two family members of a police officer who were killed in an attack blamed on the Taliban.
"They were in their cars when the incident happened," Mr Mojadidi said. "There is no doubt that the Taliban were behind it."
News of the attack came after police said two Afghans working for British aid agency Save the Children Fund were wounded in a Taliban attack west of the northern town of Mazar-i-Sharif on Sunday, the second such incident there in two weeks.
And early yesterday about 20 armed men raided a base of an Afghan mine clearance agency south-west of Kabul, beat up some of its staff and stole an ambulance which they later set on fire. Mr Patrick Fruchet of the Mine Action Centre said it was unclear who was responsible.
The violence has increased doubts about the ability of the US-backed government to hold elections on schedule next June.
The bloodshed comes just after NATO took command of 5,000 foreign peacekeepers in Kabul on August 11th, and prompted fresh calls for the force's role to be extended into the provinces.