A suicide bomber killed 12 policemen in Afghanistan on Friday when he blew himself up inside a police station, officials said, as Taliban rebels vowed to fight through the holy month of Ramazan. Another suicide strike killed two people at a border crossing with Pakistan, and the militants rejected reports they would hold a cease-fire during the Ramazan that starts on Tuesday or Wednesday.
The 12 officers were killed when the bomber targeted a police station used to patrol the main road from Uruzgan province to neighbouring Kandahar, through one of Afghanistan's most volatile regions. "He detonated his explosives in a battalion station in Tirin Kot, the provincial capital of Uruzgan," Abdullah Hemat, the Uruzgan governor's spokesman, told AFP.
"The bomber, who was on foot and wearing a suicide vest, blew himself up while the policemen were having lunch. As a result, 12 policemen were killed and five others wounded," he said. The Taliban, who claimed responsibility for the attack, separately issued statement denying any Ramazan cease-fire, saying that "enemy" intelligence agents had hacked an email account and sent out a fake message. "In the holy month of Ramazan, jihad has a big reward, and we will continue our war against the enemy by continuing our attacks," Zabihullah Mujahid, an insurgent spokesman, said.
Earlier on Friday, another bomber detonated himself in Kandahar at a border crossing with Pakistan, killing two people including a senior Afghan police commander. "A suicide bomber wearing a vest of explosives crossed the border into Kandahar's Spin Boldak district Friday morning and blew himself up," Javed Faisal, spokesman for the Kandahar governor, told AFP. "A top border police commander and a civilian were killed, and eight others, including two border police and civilians were wounded." The Spin Boldak-Chaman border crossing is a key route from Quetta, which gives its name to the Quetta shura Taliban council, and Kandahar, the insurgency's heartland in southern Afghanistan.