Two Nepali security guards were among the nine killed Friday in a coordinated suicide attack in the Afghan capital, officials said. Six Taliban militants attacked the British Council -- a British government agency promoting education and culture -- in a residential neighborhood in the capital early Friday, the day Afghans were celebrating independence from Britain in 1919. Afghan interior ministry Spokesman Sediq Sediqqi said two Nepali guards were among those killed. Four Afghan police and two local guards were also killed in the gunfight that lasted for hours. NATO-led international forces said one of their soldiers had died in the incident.

Hashmat Stanekzai, Afghan police spokesman also confirmed the death of Nepali guards.

An Afghan security official on condition of anonymity said the international soldier who died was from the New Zealand forces. Sediqqi said 22 others, including one Nepali guard, were injured in the incident.

Two suicide bombers detonated their bomb-laden car in front of a gate, letting other attackers inside the house. Four assailants, dressed in burqa, fought against Afghan and international security forces from inside the British Council building for at least eight hours.

The British Foreign Office confirmed that none of the victims were British nationals and that all Britons affected by the attacks are now safe. One of the injured carried out on a stretcher to an ambulance witnessed by a scribe at the site was a Nepali guard wearing a British Embassy guard force hat with visibly burnt face. The Nepali guards, known popularly as Gurkhas, with G4S Security Company were protecting the council along with other local Afghan guards.

Mohan Chettri, a worker at the G4S said he did not know of any Nepali deaths. “Three Nepali security guards were injured in the incident,” Chettri said. “The Gurkhas put up a good fight, and they were able to push the attack back,” said a US military official who was at the scene advising the Afghan national police. “The good news is that the British nationals that were in the compound made it to the safe room and they are alive and well in it.”

The Taliban took the responsibility for the attack. “This attack is a message of the Taliban to the British invaders on the occasion of the independence day when they lost to brave Afghans 92 years ago,” Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said by phone from an undisclosed location.
The residential district where the attack took place also houses foreign consulates, aid agencies, UN offices and the residences of senior politicians including the vice-president.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai in a statement condemned the Friday attack on British Council. He said the enemies of Afghanistan should be aware that carrying out such attacks is not an achievement, instead it indicates their weakness.

UK Prime Minister David Cameron condemned the “cowardly attack”. NATO-led International Security Assistance Force also condemned the attack saying it was a “despicable act of murder and destruction” on the day of Afghan independence.

The attack in the Afghan capital comes a month after international forces handed over security responsibilities of seven key areas to Afghans in a process that will be completed by 2014.

Published on: 20 August 2011 | Republica