Militant attacks and a roadside bomb explosion killed 11 policemen and an army soldier on Sunday in areas of southern Afghanistan plagued by a violent Taliban insurgency, authorities said. Six policemen were killed when Taliban-linked militants stormed their post in troubled Helmand province, the interior ministry said in a statement.
"In an armed clash between the national police and armed terrorists, six police were martyred," it said, adding that the rebels fled after reinforcements were sent to the area. Hours later, five other policemen were killed in another attack by Taliban insurgents on a post in the south-western province of Nimroz, provincial governor Ghulam Dastgir Azad told AFP.
The rebels, who were on motorbikes, used machine guns and rockets to attack, first killing one of the men at a gate before entering the compound, he said. Two other policemen were wounded, the governor added.
Also on Sunday, a roadside bomb exploded near a convoy of Afghan army soldiers in Zabul province, which borders Helmand, killing one soldier and injuring three others, the defence ministry said. The attack was blamed on "terrorists", a term used to refer to Taliban and allied militant groups.
In other violence, six militants - including a "foreign national" - were killed in a clash with troops on Saturday in Uruzgan, another flashpoint of the Taliban insurgency also on the border with Helmand, the interior ministry said.