On Afghan base, 3 U.S. soldiers shot
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan — An Afghan soldier opened fire Sunday inside a base in the southern Helmand province, wounding three U.S. soldiers before being shot dead.
Navy Cpt. Bill Salvin, a U.S. military spokesman, said coalition forces had killed the soldier “to end the attack,” but Col. Mohammad Rasoul Zazai, an Afghan army spokesman, said the soldier had made a “mistake” and had not fired deliberately.
Elsewhere in Afghanistan, Taliban insurgents attacked a district headquarters in the Kandahar province using a suicide car bomb, said Samim Khpolwak, a spokesman for the governor.
A security official said six police were killed and five others were wounded in the assault, which was claimed by the Taliban.
In the southern Zabul province, an army operation killed 13 Taliban and wounded 11 others, said Gen. Sadiqullah Saberi. He said two Afghan soldiers were killed and three others were wounded by a roadside bomb during the operation.
Germany rejects Trump NATO claim
BERLIN — Germany has rejected President Donald Trump’s claim that the country owes NATO large sums for spending too little on defense.
Trump tweeted Saturday that “Germany owes vast sums of money to NATO and the United States must be paid more for the powerful, and very expensive, defense it provides to Germany!”
Berlin’s defense budget has long been below NATO’s target of 2 percent of a member’s gross domestic product.
German Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen said Sunday that “there’s no debtor’s account at NATO,” adding: “To tie the 2 percent of defense spending, which we want to achieve in the middle of the next decade, only to NATO, is wrong.”
Malaysia seeking
more N. Koreans
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia — Malaysian police said Sunday that they are hunting for more North Korean suspects over the killing of the half brother of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
National police chief Khalid Abu Bakar said the new suspects are in addition to the seven North Koreans already being sought in last month’s poisoning death of Kim Jong Nam at Kuala Lumpur’s airport.
Khalid said the new suspects include an “important person,” but he declined to give further details.
“I do not deny that there are more North Koreans involved in the murder of Kim Jong Nam. We will follow the legal channel to get them,” he said. “I do not want to say more than that. If I do, they may run … but we believe there is an important person, too.”
Malaysian authorities say two women smeared Kim’s face with the banned VX nerve agent on Feb. 13 at a crowded airport terminal. He died within 20 minutes. The two women, an Indonesian and a Vietnamese, have been charged with murder.
Four of the seven initial North Korean suspects left Malaysia on the day of the killing.