11 dead in fire at Kandahar protest; 30 held

KANDAHAR CITY (PAN protest in the Maiwand district of southern Kandahar province, officials said on Wednesday.

Javed Faisal, the governor’s spokesman, told Pajhwok Afghan News eight of the gunmen among the protestors were killed after they fired at police before noon.

A suicide bomber and 30 suspected militants, who joined hundreds of people in their protest against Pakistan, had been by security forces, the spokesman said.

A number of militants, after joining the demonstrators, raised slogans against Afghan forces and opened fired at them, according to Faisal, who said the policemen suffered no casualties.

The insurgents also fired at vehicles on the Kandahar-Herat highway, killing three drivers. Retaliatory fire from security forces left eight rebels dead, he said, calling the detainees members of different Taliban groups.

An explosives-rigged motorbike was also seized in the area, where the insurgents set fire to a number of vehicles, Faisal continued, believing some of the detainees had sneaked into Maiwand from Pakistan.

Entering the sixth consecutive day, the protests erupted after an Afghan border policeman was killed in skirmishes between the neighbours in the Goshta district of eastern Nangarhar province.

Also on Wednesday, the angry Afghans — most of them university students — staged demonstrations in Kabul, Bamyan, Nangarhar, Laghman, Herat, Kandahar and other provinces.

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