Afghanistan News Wire

Gunmen kill two as fears mount for Afghan election

August 8, 2004

From Noor Khan in Kandahar

The Sunday Herald

Gunmen ambushed a convoy carrying election workers into a remote Taliban stronghold, killing two and bringing to 12 the number of people slain while preparing for the landmark presidential vote.

Meanwhile, the US military urged the Afghan government to take “immediate action” to find those behind recent deadly attacks on relief workers that have further restricted reconstruction efforts.

At least 30 militants shot at the jeeps from the joint Afghan-UN electoral body on Friday as they passed through Char Cheno, a district of central Uruzgan province, said governor Jan Mohammed Khan.

Khan said Hassan Khan and Khathari Jan, two members of a team registering voters for the joint Afghan-UN electoral commission, were killed and all four vehicles destroyed by fire after being strafed with assault-rifle and machine-gun fire.

Guards in the convoy shot back, forcing the assailants to retreat into the mountains, Khan said. One Taliban fighter was captured, he said, but gave no further details.

Uruzgan and neighbouring Zabul have been the scene of some of the worst fighting in recent months, and attacks have increased as the nation gears up for its first post-Taliban election on October 9.

Six US soldiers were wounded, two of them seriously, in Zabul on Friday when insurgents mounted attacks with a mortar and explosives, the US military said.

The military initially listed eight injured soldiers, but said yesterday that they were mistaken and gave further details of the attacks.

In the first incident, insurgents attacked a 10-vehicle convoy near Daychopan, a notorious trouble spot, with a truck-mounted mortar.

Major Scott Nelson, a US spokesman, said one vehicle was hit, injuring four soldiers with shrapnel. US troops returned fire, injuring and capturing two of the assailants before the rest retreated.

Two of the soldiers were treated and returned to duty. The other two were in a stable condition and would be flown to a military hospital in Germany, Nelson said.

Rebels also set off a roadside bomb near Zabul’s provincial capital, Qalat, as another Humvee was passing. Two soldiers were injured, but quickly returned to duty.

Twenty-one American soldiers have died in action this year, already the worst tally for the US military since it entered Afghanistan in 2001.

The toll on aid workers is higher still, after the execution-style slaying on Tuesday of two Afghans from a German agency in southeastern Paktia province brought the total to 24. It was unclear who carried out the killing, but aid officials have dismissed police suggestions that the motive was robbery.

The incident follows the June 2 killing of five workers from Medecins Sans Frontieres in a previously peaceful northwestern province which prompted the relief group to withdraw from Afghanistan after 24 years.

MSF said it was dismayed at the failure to arrest local commanders suspected in the killings and the US military said that it, too, expected more.

“Senseless acts of violence like the ones against Malteser [aid agency] and Medecins Sans Frontieres … require immediate and deliberate action to bring those responsible to justice,” Nelson said.

Malteser Germany and the UN refugee agency, which were working together on a project to help former refugees, have suspended operations in the region.

08 August 2004

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