By DPA,
Kunduz (Afghanistan) : A group of insurgents stormed a checkpoint in the northern province of Baghlan Monday and killed eight policemen, the provincial governor said.
The attack took place in the province’s Baghlan Markazi district early Monday when a group of insurgents began “firing at the check post from all sides”, said Mohammad Akbar Barekzai, the provincial governor.
The checkpoint had been recently erected on the main highway linking Baghlan to neighbouring Kunduz province to provide security for NATO convoys in the area, he said.
One militant was killed and another was wounded in the pre-dawn raid, said Ahmad Jan, a senior police official in the province. He said the militants also seized a police ranger and the dead policemen’s weapons.
Mirwais, who claims to speak for Hezbi Islami militant group in the region, told DPA by phone from an undisclosed location that their fighters killed 15 police personnel. Like many Afghans he uses only a single name.
Hezbi Islami is a group associated with the Taliban insurgents, who have jointly waged a bloody war against the Western-backed Afghan government and more than 100,000 international troops stationed in the country.
Hezbi Islami’s leader, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who fought against the Soviet troops in the 1980s and served as a prime minister during the country’s civil war in 1990s, is currently believed to be hiding along the porous border between Afghanistan and Pakistan.