Suicide bombers' being trained in Afghanistan'

Suicide bombers are being trained to carry out attacks on foreign troops deployed in Afghanistan, the Interior Minister said today.

Ali Ahmad Jalali issued the warning just days after four German peacekeepers were killed by a man who crashed a taxi packed with explosives into their bus. Twenty-nine German peacekeepers were wounded.

“There are efforts underway to train suicide bombers in order to be used in Afghanistan against foreign troops,” Jalali said in Kabul. He gave no details of who was training them, or where.

Germany’s defence minister said yesterday that Saturday’s attack on the bus was carried out by a member of Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaida network.

Peter Struck said the bomber also links to renegade warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and Afghanistan’s former Taliban regime – three groups staunchly opposed to Afghanistan’s new government and President Hamid Karzai.

About 5,000 international peacekeepers have been deployed in Kabul since December 2001 to bolster security in the capital.

Large numbers of foreign aid workers, helping Afghanistan rebuild after nearly a quarter of a century of war, are also based in the city.

Another 11,500 coalition troops, most of them Americans, are in the country to hunt down fighters still loyal to the Taliban and their allies.