Coordinated attacks by Taliban at Kabul, no Indian target

KABUL: Taliban militants unleashed a wave of coordinated suicide and gun attacks in Afghanistan targeting the diplomatic area, NATO bases, and the Parliament at seven locations in Kabul and three other eastern cities but no Indian target was attacked.

An External Affairs Ministry statement issued in Delhi said all Indian citizens were safe.

ITBP Director General Ranjit Sinha said there was no threat to the Indian embassy as it was located three to four km away from the scene of the attack this afternoon. All Indian installations were also safe, he said.

Taliban claimed responsibility for the multiple attacks by an unknown number of its men armed with light and heavy weapons and grenades who came from different directions in central Kabul.

NATO said it had reports of attacks in seven locations in Kabul where fighting was still raging several hours after the start of the assault. They included a newly built five-star 'Kabul star' hotel.

"So far 11 men from Afghan National Police were wounded by the attacks in Kabul, and we have no reports of wounded or killed civilians in Kabul," Siddiq Sidiqq, the spokesman of Afghanistan's interior ministry, said by phone.

According to some reports, 24 people were in all injured and that seven militants were killed

The militants attacked five-star Kabul Star Hotel in Wazir Akhbar Khan area of the capital and some tried to enter the Afghan parliament firing rockets but were engaged by security forces and driven back, officials said.

The militants also struck at cities in three provinces--an airport in Jalalabad, Logar and Paktia.

"I am on the spot and hearing the gunfire being traded between the suicide bombers and Afghan forces. Until now I heard several explosions," a PTI correspondent reported from the scene of attack.

A number of Taliban militants took positions at a newly-built building at the Shahr-e-Naw, a neighborhood of Kabul. They battled with Afghan forces for several hours after the militants began assaulting Western embassies.