Gunmen attack on police leaves 4 dead and 5 missing in Afghanistan

Suspected Taliban gunmen attacked a police checkpoint in southern Afghanistan and killed four officers and wounded two others in a gun clash, officials said Tuesday.

Five other police officers were missing after the attack late Monday in Maywand district, Kandahar province, a former stronghold of the Taliban before the regime was ousted by U.S.-led forces in 2001, said regional government chief Khan Agha Amin.

The assailants fled after battling with police for about 30 minutes, and local security forces launched a manhunt for them, he said.

It was not immediately clear if the Taliban suffered any casualties. They regularly take their dead and wounded with them after fighting.

In violence elsewhere, militants shot dead a police intelligence officer as he was walking in Zabul province, while separately police arrested six suspected Taliban insurgents in a raid on a house in the region, officials said.

Fighting has escalated in Afghanistan in the past half year, leaving more than 1,400 people dead and raising fears for the country's nascent democracy.

P.T.