KABUL, Afghanistan — Insurgents struck in the heart of the Afghan capital Friday with suicide attackers and a car bomb, targeting hotels used by foreigners and killing at least 16 people and wounding dozens, police said.
The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attacks, which Afghan President Hamid Karzai said were aimed at Indians working in Kabul.
The Taliban has long opposed India’s involvement in the country and its ties to the Northern Alliance that helped the U.S. oust the Taliban regime in 2001 and formed the backbone of Karzai’s government.
Six Indians were killed in the attacks, a spokesman for the country’s foreign ministry said, revising the number from the ministry’s original estimate of up to nine Indians dead. An Italian diplomat and a French filmmaker were also among the dead. Three Afghan police were killed, and six more officers were among the 36 people wounded, Afghan government officials said.
The four-hour assault began about 6:30 a.m. with a car bombing that leveled a residential hotel used by Indian doctors. A series of explosions and gunbattles left blood and debris in the rain-slicked streets and underscored the militants’ ability to strike in the heavily defended capital even as NATO marshals its forces against them in the volatile south.
Dr. Subodh Sanjivpaul of India said he was holed up in his bathroom for three hours inside one of the small hotels where he lived with other Indians.
“Today’s suicide attack took place in our residential complex,” Sanjivpaul said at a military hospital where his wounded foot was bandaged. “When I was coming out, I found two or three dead bodies. When firing was going on, the first car bomb exploded and the full roof came on my head.”
The Kabul attacks came two weeks into a major offensive against the southern Taliban stronghold of Marjah, where thousands of U.S., Afghan and NATO soldiers are battling to drive out insurgents. The British government said one of its soldiers was killed Friday by an explosion while on a foot patrol — the 14th NATO service member to die in the operation.