Taliban fighters wearing suicide vests and armed with AK-47 rifles and rocket-propelled grenades attacked the main police station in the eastern Afghan city of Khost yesterday. Their assault triggered lengthy gun battles that left seven militants dead and 14 people wounded, officials said.
The attack was one of the most audacious in recent years and took place in an area that it was hoped had been stabilised. Khost is a major provincial centre and the site of one of the biggest US bases in Afghanistan.
The assault signalled a further escalation in Taliban tactics of targeting poorly defended government installations rather than heavily armed international troops. One aim is to drive a wedge between local forces and officials and those trying to protect them. Local forces are attacked directly, international soldiers are struck with remote-controlled bombs.
In recent weeks, tribal leaders have seen a major influx of fighters who are fleeing operations on the Pakistani side of the porous frontier 12 miles from Khost where Islamabad's soldiers have begun moving against key insurgent havens.
The attack began in the afternoon when at least six insurgents wearing explosives stormed the area around the main police station and a nearby government-run bank. All were shot and killed before they could detonate their vests, the Interior Ministry said in a statement. A seventh attacker detonated a car bomb near a police rapid reaction force, wounding two policemen. Sporadic firing could still be heard late in the afternoon.
Khost has long been a flashpoint. This year 11 Taliban suicide bombers struck government buildings there, killing 20 people and wounding three Americans. Documents obtained by the Observer reveal that several of the attackers were from overseas and that Taliban commanders were angry at what they felt was a failed operation because of poor co-ordination.
Though attention has focused on the south of Afghanistan, there has been violence throughout the east too. Last week suspected Taliban militants launched near-simultaneous assaults in Gardez, about 50 miles northwest of Khost, and in the eastern city of Jalalabad, which had been calm.
Western strategy in Afghanistan is based on clearing terrain then handing control to local forces so they can eventually leave. Afghan defence officials said that they expected violence to become worse over the summer.
