[Quqnoos] Afghan agents arrested four militants allegedly responsible for killing the country's deputy intelligence chief.Abdullah Laghmani, the deputy head of Afghanistan's intelligence service, who was visiting his hometown on September 2, was killed along with 23 other people, mostly civilians, when a suicide bomber targeted him in Mihtarlam, the capital city of the eastern province of Laghman.
More than 70 others, most of them civilians, were wounded in the attack. Abdul Rahman, a military commander of Taliban fighters in Laghman, and three of his associates were arrested for planning the attack, the intelligence service, the National Directorate of Security, said in a statement on Tuesday.
Rahman confessed that he received an order for the bombing from Shahid Khel and Maulawi Kabir, two Taliban leaders living in Peshawar, Pakistan, the statement noted.
The attack was carried out by a Pakistani national by the name of Abdul Jabar, it said, citing Rahman's confession.
The statement also said that by arresting the group, the agency foiled an attack on Laghman's governor because the group planned to target the provincial headquarters with a truck loaded with 2,500 kilograms of explosives.
The would-be suicide bombing was also plotted by Taliban leaders in Peshawar and was planned to be carried out by two Pakistani bombers, the statement added.
Afghan officials have repeatedly blamed Pakistan's government for allowing the Afghan Taliban to run training camps inside Pakistan, from where they plot attacks on Afghan soldiers and the more than 110,000 foreign troops stationed in Afghanistan.