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Afghan Taliban Claim Responsibility Attack on US Intel Workers

   VOA News 31 December 2009
   Protestors in Kabul

Photo: AP

   Afghans  chant  anti  American  slogans in Kabul, Afghanistan during a
   protest  against  the  recent  killings  of  10 civilians allegedly by
   coalition forces in Kunar province, 30 Dec 2009

   Italicize
   The  Taliban has claimed responsibility for a suicide blast in eastern
   Afghanistan  that  killed eight Americans Wednesday.  Employees of the
   U.S. Central Intelligence Agency are reported to be among the dead.
   Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said Thursday that the attack on a
   U.S.  base in Khost province was carried out by an Afghan army officer
   working for the militants.
   U.S. officials said the bomber got inside the base - Forward Operating
   Base  Chapman  -  before  he  detonated  his  explosive  vest near the
   facility's gym.
   Current  and  former  U.S.  officials say some of the victims were CIA
   officers,  while  the  others  may have been civilians working for the
   American intelligence agency.  At least six other people were wounded,
   some severely.
   The CIA has not commented on the incident.
   The  agency  has  been  increasing its presence in the region over the
   past  year  in  advance  of the U.S. troop surge, helping launch drone
   attacks    on    al-Qaida    and    Taliban    positions   along   the
   Afghanistan-Pakistan border.
   The  site  of  Wednesday's  suicide  attack, Khost, borders Pakistan's
   North  Waziristan  tribal  region,  which  has  served  as  a  base of
   operations for Taliban militants and their allies.
   Afghan  officials claim more civilians have been killed, the reuslt of
   a  foreign  airstrike in the country's Helmand province. Officials say
   the  air  strike  took place Wednesday, near the provincial capital of
   Lashkar Gah.  Witnesses say at least eight civilians were killed.
   Earlier Wednesday, the Afghan government charged foreign troops killed
   10  civilians  -  including school children - in eastern Afghanistan's
   Kunar province on Sunday.  But a spokesman for international troops in
   Afghanistan  says  NATO  so  far has no direct evidence to support the
   allegation.
   NATO  released  a statement Wednesday saying its forces were targeting
   insurgents  when troops came under fire. The alliance says nine people
   were killed when NATO forces returned fire.
   Hundreds  of  university  students took to the streets in Kabul and in
   the eastern city of Jalalabad Wednesday to protest the killings.
   In  a  separate incident Wednesday, the Canadian defense ministry says
   four  Canadian  soldiers  and  a  Canadian journalist were killed when
   their  convoy  hit  a  roadside  bomb while on patrol just outside the
   southern city of Kandahar.
   The  journalist  was identified as 34-year-old Calgary Herald reporter
   Michelle Lang.  A Canadian civilian official was wounded in the blast.
   The  Canadian  newspaper says Lang is the first Canadian journalist to
   die in the Afghan war since Canada joined the international mission in
   2002.

   Some information for this report was provided by AFP and Reuters.

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