Attacks on Afghan police kill 10

A suicide bomber killed two policemen in northeastern Afghanistan on Thursday, hours after a Taliban attack on a police post on the other side of the insurgency-hit nation left eight dead, officials said.

Abdul Maroof Rasekh, provincial spokesman for Badakhshan, in the country's far north-east, said: "A suicide attacker targeted a group of local police forces in Keshm district today killing the commander of local police in the district and one of his bodyguards."

He named the commander as Nazek Mir, adding that 18 civilians had been wounded in the bombing, most of them seriously.

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid claimed responsibility in a text message sent to AFP, saying five guards as well as the commander were killed. The Taliban are known to routinely exaggerate their claims.

Earlier, Naqibullah Farahi, spokesman for the western province of Farah, which borders Iran, said Taliban gunmen had killed eight local policemen in an attack on a remote post in Khaki Safed district late on Wednesday.

"There were eight people in the post and all were killed," he said.

Contacted by AFP, Taliban spokesman Qari Yousuf Ahmadi claimed responsibility for that attack and said 12 local policemen had been killed.

Afghan police are regularly targeted by the militants who have been fighting a decade-long insurgency against President Hamid Karzai's Western-backed government.

Earlier this week six people including four policemen were poisoned and shot dead at a police post in Helmand province, which neighbours Farah, days after a policeman in Paktika province poisoned and then shot dead nine of his colleagues while they slept.

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