Afghan Intel Deputy Killed In Suicide Attack
Afghanistan's deputy chief of intelligence was among at least 23 people killed Wednesday in a suicide bombing east of Kabul. The killing highlights the Taliban's increasing ability to carry off complex and targeted attacks.
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In Afghanistan today, the country's second ranking intelligence official was killed by a suicide bomber. At least 22 other people died when a member of the Taliban blew himself up outside a mosque in a province east of Kabul.
NPR's Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson has the story from Kabul.
SORAYA SARHADDI NELSON: The suicide attacker who arrived on foot blew himself up just as Deputy Intelligence Chief Abdullah Laghmani was leaving a mosque in the capital of Laghman province. The city is 60 miles east of Kabul. A Taliban spokesman said Laghmani was the target of the attack. Also killed in the blast were the head of Laghmani's provincial council and a top aide to its governor. Most of the other casualties were civilians. Officials say the deputy spy chief had gone to the mosque to discuss plans for rebuilding it.
American troops quickly cordoned off the blast site, which was in a crowded market area. Laghmani was the former intelligence chief in Kandahar. The southern province is the birth place of the Taliban. He was an ethnic Pashtun like most of the insurgents but fought with the Tajik-led faction to oust the Taliban when it ruled here. Laghmani was the second Afghan intelligence official killed by the Taliban in recent days. Police say the body of an intelligence officer kidnapped a few days earlier in Kunduz province in the north was found hanging from a tree today in a neighboring province.
Meanwhile the presidential race that is stoking tensions across Afghanistan appears to be headed to a run-off in October. Afghan election officials say the incumbent President Hamid Karzai has slightly widened his lead with 60 percent of the votes now tallied. But Karzai is still short of the 50.1 percent of the votes he needs to be declared the outright winner. His tough rival is former foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah, who has less than 33 percent of the vote.
Even when all the votes are finally counted they cannot be certified until investigations into widespread allegations of election fraud are completed. The electoral complaints commission says its review of 652 of the most serious charges is underway.
Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson, NPR News, Kabul.
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