Kabul:Gunmen on a motorbike killed a South African aid worker in Kabul and NATO-led troops assaulted an insurgent stronghold just west of the capital, sparking a two-day battle that killed 20 militants, officials said today.
The South African woman worked with handicapped Afghans and was killed today in the western part of Kabul as she was walking alone at around 8 am, said Najib Samsoor, a district police chief.
The attack adds to a growing sense of insecurity in Kabul. The capital city is now blanketed with police checkpoints. Embassies, military bases and the UN are erecting cement barriers to guard against suicide bombings.
Kidnappings targeting wealthy Afghans have long been a problem in Kabul, but attacks against Westerners in the city and surrounding provinces have also increased recently. In mid-August, Taliban militants killed three women working for the US aid group International Rescue Committee while they were driving in Logar, one province south of Kabul.
To the west of Kabul, assault helicopters dropped NATO troops into Jalrez district of Wardak province yesterday, sparking a two-day battle involving airstrikes, the military alliance said in a statement today. More than 20 militants were killed.
Wardak province, just 60 kilometers west of Kabul, has become an insurgent stronghold.
Militants have expanded their traditional bases in the country's south and east - along the border with Pakistan - and have gained territory in the provinces surrounding Kabul, a worrying development for Afghan and NATO troops.
Those advances are part of the reason that top US military officials have warned that the international mission to defeat the Taliban is in peril, and why NATO generals have called for a sharp increase in the number of troops here.
