Al-Qaida men held in swoop

Afghan police and international peacekeepers raided a compound in the capital Kabul early today and arrested eight men with suspected links to al-Qaida and a group loyal to a banned Afghan warlord, a spokesman for the peacekeepers said.

Among those taken in was one man believed to be a senior member of renegade warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar’s Hezb-e-Islami group, said Commander Chris Henderson.