Taliban attack Afghan government office

Dozens of Taliban rebels captured and burned a remote Afghan government outpost before disappearing back over the Pakistani border, a local official said today.

An Afghan soldier was missing after the attack late on Saturday in Shorabak, 370 miles south-west of the capital, Kabul, in Kandahar province, Mayor Haji Fazel Mohammed said.

Sixty Taliban rode into the town in pickup trucks and drove some 50 government troops from the building during a three-hour gunbattle, Mohammed said.

“The Taliban seized the building and set it alight,” said the official, who was out of town at the time. “It was badly damaged.”

One soldier and a government pickup truck were missing, he said. It was unclear if he fled with the vehicle or was abducted.

Mohammed said pools of blood were found in three places, suggesting several Taliban were wounded.

“I think they came from Pakistan and they drove off again in that direction,” he said.

Nearly 500 people have reportedly died in violence across Afghanistan this year, including dozens of government soldiers and officials as well as more than 80 militants killed by American-led forces in the south in the past three weeks.