Afghan forces to take over security in Kabul

While the Taliban insurgency has surged this year, with more suicide and roadside bombs and more people killed than at anytime since 2001, Afghan forces are steadily growing in size and Kabul has seen fewer attacks in 2008 than in the same period last year.

"Afghan security forces will soon begin to gradually take over security of Kabul from international forces," Afghan Defence Ministry spokesman General Mohammad Zaher Azimi told a news conference.

Some 70,000 foreign troops under the command of NATO and the U.S.-led coalition are based in Afghanistan, fighting a Taliban insurgency to overthrow the pro-Western Afghan government.

NATO's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) is currently in overall charge of the security in the capital.

Neither the Defense Ministry, nor ISAF gave any precise time for the handover of security.

Some 2,500 people, including about 1,000 civilians, have been killed already this year, aid agencies say, and each of the last three months has seen more violent incidents than any month since U.S.-led and Afghan forces overthrew the Taliban in 2001.

Kabul has suffered high-profile attacks this year, such as the January suicide bombing of a hotel, a bid to kill President Hamid Karzai in April and the bombing of the Indian Embassy last month, but the number of incidents in the capital is down.

While violence has increased in Afghanistan this year, it is not spreading, an ISAF spokesman said. Some 73 percent of clashes took place in only 10 percent of districts, he said; the same districts where 70 percent of the violence occurred last year.

But more than six years after the Taliban were overthrown, many Afghans are growing increasingly frustrated with the failure of their government and foreign forces to bring security.

Many Afghans are especially angry over reports of civilian casualties which feed a perception that international troops do not take enough care to avoid killing ordinary Afghans.

Afghan authorities were checking reports that more than a dozen civilians were killed by a foreign forces air strike northeast of Kabul, an official said.

Ten Taliban militants had been killed in the strike in the Tagab district of Kapisa province on Saturday, Azimi said, adding no civilians were hurt in the operation.

NATO said it was investigating the incident, but also said had no evidence so far that civilians had been hurt.

Australia's Defense Ministry said on Sunday it had captured a senior Taliban official in the southern province of Uruzgan.

Photo: Reuters