Kabul: Six UN foreign staff were killed when Taliban militants attacked an international guest-house in Kabul on Wednesday, while rockets were fired at a foreign-owned hotel in the Afghan capital, forcing 100 guests into a bunker.
An increasingly resurgent Taliban have vowed to stage attacks ahead of a run-off in Afghanistan's presidential election on November 7 and the apparently coordinated assault on Wednesday will raise questions about security for the vote.
The attacks occurred as US President Barack Obama weighs whether to send more soldiers to Afghanistan to fight a Taliban insurgency at its fiercest since 2001.
''The number right now is six dead, all of them UN staff,'' said Spokesman for the United Nations Mission in Afghanistan, Adrian Edwards, adding at least nine were wounded in the attack on the guest-house.
Their nationalities were unclear. Afghan forces exchanged gunfire for hours with militants inside the house, police said.
Later the bodies of three suspected suicide bombers, apparently ripped apart when they detonated their explosives, could be seen lying inside the compound.
Abdul Ghaim, a policeman at the scene, told Reuters: ''We think they (the militants) are Pakistani.''
Officials said the shooting was over but one female guest at the house was still missing and a search was under way inside the building, covered by bullet holes and badly damaged with its walls charred and windows shattered.
''Several Taliban suiciders (took) hostage several UN workers in Kabul,'' the Islamist movement said in an English-language text message sent to Reuters.
LUXURY HOTEL TARGETED
Explosions also hit the foreign-owned Serena luxury hotel and rockets were fired at the building near the presidential palace, witnesses and security sources said.
A foreigner staying at the hotel told Reuters more than 100 people were rushed to an underground bunker following the attacks but no casualties or smoke could be seen from the building, also attacked in January 2008 when six people were killed.
The entire area at the Serena had been blocked by security forces. All streets leading to key government buildings were cordoned off, and sirens wailed across the heart of the capital.
Efforts to stabilise Afghanistan have been complicated by weeks of political tension over an election in August marred by widespread fraud in favour of President Karzai, forcing the second round vote.
Violence in Afghanistan has risen ahead of the run-off.
Eight US troops were killed in southern Afghanistan on Tuesday, the NATO-led alliance said, in the deadliest month for US forces since the start of the war eight years ago.
US soldiers now make up two-thirds of the 100,000-strong coalition force, with Obama considering proposals to send an extra 40,000 troops or a far smaller number.
Ahead of that decision, the New York Times reported that the brother of Afghan President Hamid Karzai had been getting regular payments from the Central Intelligence Agency and was a suspected player in Afghanistan's opium trade.
Ahmed Wali Karzai was quoted as denying the report and the CIA neither confirmed nor denied the payments.
''No intelligence organisation worth the name would ever entertain these kinds of allegations,'' a CIA spokesman told Reuters.
POLICY REVIEW
The eight US soldiers killed on Tuesday pushed the October death toll to 53, topping the previous high of 51 deaths in August, Pentagon officials said.
Karzai's camp said on Tuesday a run-off must take place even if his challenger, Abdullah Abdullah, quits the race.
Karzai agreed last week to a run-off under severe international pressure after a UN-led fraud investigation annulled a large chunk of his votes in the original election.
Although most recent polls have shown a decline in American public support for the war, an NBC/Wall Street Journal poll released on Tuesday found 47 per cent of respondents supported raising troop levels, with 43 per cent opposed. That was a reversal from a similar poll in September.
As part of his review of US strategy in Afghanistan, Obama is set to meet on Friday with the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, and the heads of the military services, the White House said.
Illustrating the region's importance to Washington in its anti-militant efforts, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was in Pakistan on Wednesday, promising a new page in relations and several civilian investment deals.
The United States is pressing Islamabad to fight militants from Afghanistan who shelter on the Pakistan side of the border.
"Earlier this morning at around 6:30am three armed attackers including at least one suicide bomber attacked a private guest house here in Kabul which is approved for use by United Nations personnel. The gunmen entered the guest house and fighting ensued" — United Nations Spokesperson, Aleem Sedique to CNN-IBN
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