An assault by Taliban insurgents on the heart of Kabul's diplomatic and military enclave has ended after 20 hours, when security forces killed the last of six attackers. Afghan interior ministry spokesman Siddiq Siddiqui told AFP that "the last attackers are dead and the fighting all over. There were six terrorists in the building and all are dead."

The attacks started Tuesday but dragged into a second day as armed men fired rockets towards the US and other embassies and the headquarters of NATO-led foreign forces. Lieutenant Colonel Jimmie Cummings, an International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) spokesman, said six foreign troops had also been injured. "Nineteen (were) wounded, 11 killed, which includes three children," Cummings told AFP, without giving immediate exact details of who the dead and wounded were. The US and British embassies and the NATO-led coalition said all their employees were safe.

Afghan security forces backed by NATO and Afghan attack helicopters fought Taliban insurgents floor-by-floor in the building in which the attackers were holed up, while suicide bombers targeted police buildings in other parts of the city.

Longest sustained attack

At least nine people were killed and 23 wounded in four attacks in the longest sustained attack on the capital since the US-led invasion a decade ago. The attack was a demonstration of the Taliban’s ability to penetrate the heart of Kabul and was a show of strength ahead of a handover of security to Afghan forces in 2014.

On the day the attack started, a US Senate panel had approved a 1.6 billion US dollar cut in projected US funding for Afghan security forces, part of a significant reduction in outlays for training and equipping Afghan army and police expected in the coming years.

Violence is at its worst since US-backed Afghan forces toppled the Taliban government in late 2001, with high levels of foreign troop deaths and record civilian casualties.

The assault was the second big attack in the city in less than a month after suicide bombers targeted the British Council headquarters in mid-August, killing nine people. In late June, insurgents launched an assault on a hotel in the capital frequented by Westerners, killing at least 10. But Tuesday's attack was even more ambitious.

Author: Sarah Berning (AFP, Reuters)
Editor: Grahame Lucas