Three Afghan construction workers were gunned down by militants while a suicide attack wounded three policemen Friday in new insurgency-linked violence, officials said on Friday. The three men were shot dead by attackers in a passing vehicle in the eastern province of Khost as they had left their lodgings and headed to work, Ismail Khail district governor Dawlat Khan Qayomi told AFP.So it's okay, y'see. They didn't execute them. They murdered them. They were just saying yesterday how much they're against the death penalty.
The official blamed the attack on the "enemies of Afghanistan," a term often used by Afghan authorities to refer to Taliban-led insurgents who target Afghan and foreign troops as well as officials or people helping with reconstruction.
In the same province, a suicide bomber detonated an explosives-filled car near a police vehicle just outside Khost city. Three policemen were wounded, one of them seriously, provincial Governor Arsala Jamal told AFP. A Taliban spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahid, said his group had carried out the attack.
"'At's right. We dunnit an' we're glad!"
US-led forces in Afghanistan announced meanwhile that its troops had killed four Al-Qaeda-linked militants Thursday in an operation aimed at a network helping to move Arab and other foreign fighters into the country. The four were shot dead near the border with Pakistan in the eastern province of Paktia's Zurmat district, the statement said. They were targeting an Al-Qaeda-linked militant "known to assist local Taliban leaders with the movement of Arabs and other foreign fighters into Afghanistan," it added.
CIA director Michael Hayden said in Washington on Thursday that the Al-Qaeda network remained resilient, having regrouped in Pakistan's tribal areas, which he described as a "safe haven" for the network.