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Blast in Afghan City of Herat Kills Five, Wounds 34
(Agencies)
Updated: 2004-07-11 16:37
An explosion in the western Afghan city of Herat Sunday killed five people
and wounded 34, raising fresh concerns about security for landmark elections due
in October, officials said.
The United Nations said the blast was the latest in a string of violent
incidents that underscored the need for more international troops to protect the
October 9 presidential vote and parliamentary elections in April next year.
The explosion came shortly before the launch of a drive to disarm militia
forces in the ancient city near the border with Iran.
The device exploded outside a military post near a busy morning market,
said Ghulam Mohammad Masoan, spokesman for the provincial governor. A doctor in
a city hospital said at least four people had been killed.
"The death toll has reached five, a child is among them. And we have 34
wounded people. said Nasir Habib, a doctor at Herat's main hospital.
The death toll could rise because some of the wounded were in critical
condition, he said. All the victims were civilians.
Herat's police chief, Zia Uddin Mahmodi, said the blast was thought to
have been caused by a bomb hidden in a bucket.
Members of the ousted Taliban militia could have been responsible, he
said.
The Taliban, ousted by U.S.-led forces in late 2001, have vowed to
disrupt the October election and have launched a string of attacks on government
and foreign troops and election workers in recent months but most of the
violence has been in the volatile south and east of the country.
Masoan said he believed it was the work of "those people who do not want
a stable Herat." He was apparently referring to rivals of the province's
powerful governor, Ismail Khan.
Herat has long been seen as one of the more stable parts of the country,
but in March fighting erupted between forces loyal to a government military
commander and members of Khan's militia.
Khan's son, Aviation Minster Mirwais Sadiq, was killed in the clash.
President Hamid Karzai's central government sent troops to intervene but
commanders loyal to Khan, who forced those of the rival military commander out
of the city, said they were not needed.
DISARMING FIGHTERS
A U.N. spokesman in Kabul said a Disarmament Demobilization and
Integration drive was due to be launched in Herat Sunday with a parade and a
ceremony at a site about 5 km (3 miles) from the site of the explosion.
One of Khan's armored militia brigades is due to be demobilized in the
campaign.
The disarming of tens of thousands of irregular fighters under the
command of regional strongmen is seen as a crucial step in Afghanistan's path to
stability.
Some regional commanders, including Khan, have warned that disarming
their forces will actually increase instability, especially while a new national
army of 12,000 is still so small.
Western diplomats and human rights groups have argued that it would be
difficult to ensure fair parliamentary elections while powerful factions, some
of them closely aligned to political parties, hold sway over large parts of
Afghanistan.
More than 20,000 U.S.-led troops are hunting remnants of the Taliban and
their al Qaeda allies in Afghanistan.
NATO has deployed about 6,500 troops, most on peacekeeping duty in Kabul. It
has agreed to send another 1,500 to Kabul and to the more stable north for the
polls -- far fewer than the United Nations and the government had been seeking.
The U.N. representative for Afghanistan said more troops were needed now.
"All the incidents that have been happening recently, including the killing
of our three female registration officers, do demonstrate that protection of the
election process is not a matter of arriving for polling day," U.N. special
representative Jean Arnault told a news briefing.
"The time for the arrival of international forces is now, not in four months
from now," he said.
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