Two nato soldiers killed in attack on afghan base in southern Helmand Province
At least four troops have been killed in an attack by Taliban gunmen on an Afghan army base south of Kabul.
Afghan troops fought off the attackers, which also took two Afghan soldiers and one female soldier hostage.
The two soldiers were taken to a Nato base in Kabul, according to police chief Dawlat Waziri. One soldier has been killed, he said.
A police officer who was among the wounded said the gunmen had shot three Taliban guards.
“Some of them, though they were wearing military equipment, were shot by the Taliban guards with AK-47 assault rifles,” the officer, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters news agency.
The attack came as security was tightened in the capital after the killing of another senior officer, Maj Gen Ahmad Zahir Shah, last 우리카지노month.
At least 10 Taliban fighters have been killed in operations targeting security forces since last year, Afghan officials say. In a statement on Thursday, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani called on Nato to increase the number of troops deployed in Afghanistan.
The head of Nato우리카지노 said earlier on Thursday that more reinforcements would be sent to Afghanistan as Nato-led forces prepare to depart for the region.
‘Shooters of death’
Afghan police said the attackers opened fire on the base, near a border post with Pakistan, before the insurgents fled.
The base lies on a volatile front line where Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) and others are trying to establish an Islamic caliphate in the north, the south and east of the country.
The killing of Zahir Shah marked the first우리카지노 time in three months that an Afghan civilian had been killed in attacks against the security forces, officials said.
Maj Gen Mohammad Sayyaf told the local media that the soldiers had stopped the Taliban gunmen from attacking the base before they ran away.
Afghan security officials said that about 30 people from the Afghan army were on the ground in the area when the attack began.
“They asked, ‘are you Afghan forces or are you Taliban?’ and they replied ‘both’,” Maj Gen Mohammad Sayyaf told Reuters news agency.
A Nato soldier on the scene was killed, too.
The attacks come after the death of a top Nato official last month, after an attack on a base in Nangarhar province that killed two Afghan special forces personnel, the office of spokesman Lieutenant General Joseph Wahl told the AF