KABUL – Insurgents wearing police uniforms and armed with suicide vests stormed a police compound in eastern Afghanistan early Sunday morning, killing three policemen in a gunfight that lasted four hours before Afghan and NATO security forces regained control of complex, government officials said.
The dawn attack occurred a mile east of the provincial capital of Khost, a volatile province bordering the tribal areas of Pakistan that have served as a haven for militants crossing into Afghanistan. It follows a pattern of attacks this spring in which insurgents wearing Afghan military or police uniforms have attacked fortified government compounds. On Saturday, a suicide bomber believed to be wearing an army uniform blew himself up in a tent on the grounds of the national military hospital in the Afghan capital of Kabul, killing at least six people who were training to be medics and wounding more than 20 others.
In Sunday’s attack, four men in Afghan border police uniforms got out of a corolla station wagon and rushed toward the traffic police department and killed the gate security guard, according to a police officer who witnessed the assault just as we was coming on duty.
“They were in ABP uniforms,” the officer, who asked not to be named, said. “I thought, what do they want this early in the morning at the traffic police department. Then they shot the guard.”
The militants ran inside and then began firing down from the top floors onto a small police base below that housed a detachment of quick reaction forces, said Mohammed Yaqoob Noorzia, the deputy provincial police chief. The men were wearing vests laden with explosives and were armed with rocket propelled grenades and AK-47s, he said.
Afghan and NATO security forces surrounded the compound and firefight ensued. A spokesman with the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force could not say if NATO troops engaged in the firefight. “We’re still getting information on it, everything is sketchy right now,” the spokesman said.
The shooting finally stopped four hours later, leaving three police officers dead and wounding four others, including a civilian who was passing by, Mr. Noorzia said. The fate of the gunmen was not immediately known.
“We don’t know how many of the suicide bombers blew themselves up and how many were killed in the firefight with police,” Mr. Noorzia said.
The attacks have raised concerns about Taliban infiltration in the Afghan national security forces, but also underscore the ease with which militants, posing as soldiers or police officers, can blend into the ranks and bypass security checkpoints.
Meanwhile, two women were killed and five other people were wounded in Zabul province in southeastern Afghanistan Sunday when their vehicle hit a roadside mine, officials said.
An employee of The New York Times in Khost contributed reporting.
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