KABUL (Agencies) – Taliban fighters opened fire, hurled grenades and staged suicide bombings in central Kabul on Friday, killing 17 people including Westerners and Indians in one of the deadliest attacks on foreigners in the Afghan capital.
The militia claimed responsibility for the attack in a telephone call to AFP.
A car bomb exploded and two smaller blasts resounded over downtown Kabul, heralding what police called a “well-planned and coordinated attack” soon after dawn.
The attacks killed 17 people, including an Italian diplomatic adviser, a Frenchman and nine Indians, officials said. Another 38 people were wounded, including eight foreigners, police said.
The Indians, who died in the incident, include two army officers, Indian government officials, an ITBP constable and a tabla player who was part of a cultural delegation to Afghanistan.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai “condemned in the strongest terms the terrorist attack in Kabul’s Shar-i-Naw area that killed and injured many civilians,” his office said in a statement.
The assault took place near the Park Residence Hotel in the Shar-i-Naw commercial district, where terrified people escaped through windows and climbed down scaffolding, said an AFP photographer and a reporter.
Shattered glass carpeted the road outside the hotel, frequented by Westerners and where many employees come from India. AFP reporters saw at least four bodies, including one in a police uniform, brought out of the building.
At least three attackers armed with guns and explosives targeted the Park Residence and the smaller Aria guesthouse on a nearby side street.
“The first explosion took place in front of the Aria… targeting mostly doctors. Subsequently two terrorists, one wearing a suicide vest, entered the Park Residence,” said Kabul police chief General Abdul Rahman Rahman.
After a shootout with the attackers, police stormed into a room where one bomber detonated his explosives, killing three police, Rahman said.
The second bomber was killed by police, Rahman added.
Witnesses said the first explosion destroyed a car, threw the engine about 15 metres away, gouging out a huge crater in the road outside the Aria and spraying body parts around the site.
Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and External Affairs Minister SM Krishna condemned the strike in Kabul which left at least nine Indians, including government officials, dead and said this was clearly aimed against the people of India and Afghanistan.
“I condemn in the strongest possible terms this senseless act of violence and barbarism which strikes at the core of everything a civilized society holds dear,” Manmohan said in a statement.
“As per the preliminary information provided by Afghan government officials, up to nine Indians, besides a few others from Afghanistan and third countries, have lost their lives,” Indian External Affairs Minister S M Krishna said in a statement in New Delhi.
The Italian man staying at the Park Residence was killed after giving information by telephone to Afghan police that enabled four other Italians to be evacuated to safety, police said.
Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said the dead man was a diplomatic adviser to Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.
FridayÂ’s assault was the worst attack in Kabul since thousands of US-led troops launched a major offensive to capture a key Taliban bastion in southern Afghanistan as part of a new strategy to end a war now in its ninth year.
Nato chief Anders Fogh Rasmussen expressed outrage saying: “Once again, the enemies of Afghanistan have killed innocent civilians, Afghans and international workers alike.”
The UN mission in Kabul, the US and Canadian embassies condemned the attacks in the strongest terms.
A Taliban spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahed, telephoned AFP to claim responsibility for the attack.