KABUL, 14 June 2004 — Ten militants linked to the the Hezb-e-Islami faction of former Prime Minister Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and his Taleban allies are being held over the killing of 11 Chinese workers in north Afghanistan last week, the provincial military commander said yesterday.
The men were detained in different parts of Kunduz province, where the killings took place, said Gen. Muhammad Dawood. The attack last Thursday was the worst on foreigners in Afghanistan since US-led forces overthrew the Taleban in late 2001.
“We had information that they were involved in the incident,” Dawood said. “They are linked to the Taleban and Hekmatyar.”
China’s official Xinhua news agency quoted Dawood as saying on Saturday probably 14 gunmen were involved and were members of Hekmatyar’s party who later joined the Taleban. The workers were killed early on Thursday while they slept in tents outside Kunduz town. The victims were employed by a Chinese firm implementing a World Bank-funded road project.
The attack was a further blow to efforts to reconstruct and provide essential aid to the war-battered country and raised questions about whether plans to hold landmark elections in September are viable, given worsening security.
The Taleban, which has claimed responsibility for repeated attacks on aid and reconstruction workers elsewhere in Afghanistan, has denied it killed the Chinese.
China has strongly condemned the attacks on its workers and urged the government to bring those responsible to justice.
An official at the Chinese Embassy said that a delegation had arrived in the Afghan capital from China to investigate the killings.
The government says Hekmatyar’s forces work closely with the Taleban and share their determination to force foreign troops out of the country, to disrupt aid work and the elections. The election has already been delayed from June because of worries about violence, the slow pace of disarmament of tens of thousands of factional militiamen and slow voter registration.
Elsewhere in Afghanistan at the weekend, government forces said they killed three guerrillas among a group of about 60 who attacked and burned a district building in Kandahar province on Saturday night.
District chief Haji Faisal Mohammed said about 300 government soldiers withdrew during the attack in Surabak district and then staged a counter-attack.
In the central province of Ghor, government troops said they forced a renegade commander to flee to the mountains on Saturday after a day of fighting in which at least three people died.
Provincial security commander Gen. Zaman said one government soldier and two of rival commander Abdul Sattar’s men had been killed, while five had been arrested.
Sattar moved to Ghor from neighboring Herat province with an armed force after losing his command in Defense Ministry reforms. He said 10 people had been killed in the fighting, but gave no breakdown, while 13 of his men were missing.
