KABUL (AFP) — Attacks on Afghan police left five policemen and three Taliban fighters dead, authorities said Monday, in the latest in a wave of militant strikes on the fledgling force.
The new unrest came after the British defence ministry announced that three of its soldiers were killed in a suicide bombing in the southern province of Helmand on Sunday, taking the country's toll in Afghanistan to 100.
A roadside bomb blew up a police vehicle in the central province of Ghazni early Monday, killing a highway commander and two of his men, provincial deputy police chief Mohammad Zaman told AFP.
The commander, Abdul Qayoum, was returning to Ghazni town from the remote district of Rashidan which has been without a police commander since Taliban militants took control of the district headquarters last month, Zaman said.
The rebels were ejected less than 24 hours later but took with them the administration and police officials. Authorities said they suspected the officials had been working with the Taliban.
"Qayoum and two other policemen were killed in the blast and their vehicle was destroyed," Zaman said.
There was no claim of responsibility for the bombing. Ghazni, roughly halfway between Kabul and Kandahar, has over the past year become one of the provinces most affected by Taliban attacks.
Six policemen were killed in a Taliban ambush in the province on Sunday, the interior ministry said. Two civilians died in the crossfire.
Police also reported Monday that Taliban rebels had attacked a post in the central province of Ghor on Sunday, sparking a gunfight that left two policeman and three rebels dead.
Another policeman and six of the attackers were wounded in the fighting, provincial police chief Shahjahan Noori told AFP.
The Taliban were removed from government in a US-led invasion in late 2001 and are waging an insurgency that has picked up over the past two years.
There are nearly 70,000 foreign soldiers from more than 40 nations helping the growing Afghan army and police force to tackle the insurgents and rising crime.
The three British soldiers were killed Sunday while on a routine foot patrol near their base in Helmand, the British defence ministry said.
Their deaths raised the overall number of fatalities among British troops since 2001 to 100.
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