KABUL: The Taliban targeted top government officials in Afghanistan Wednesday, killing seven people in a suicide car bombing and firing rockets at the vice president and interior minister, who escaped unhurt. Both of the attacks struck central Afghanistan, not far from the heavily secured capital Kabul, and were claimed by the militia leading a nearly 10-year insurgency against US-led NATO troops and the Afghan government. In the first attack, an attacker drove a car laden with explosives towards the education and agriculture departments in Mahmud Raqi, the capital of Kapisa province northeast of Kabul. Officials said the driver blew himself up when he was stopped at a nearby checkpoint. Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said it had carried out the attack which he claimed had targeted the French ambassador to Afghanistan and French soldiers who were visiting the governor's office at the time. In the second incident, Afghan Vice President Karim Khalili and Interior Minister Besmullah Mohammadi escaped after a rocket attack targeted a police centre they were visiting but landed close by instead. Provincial spokesman Shahidullah Shahid said the attack happened in the Chaki Wardak district of Wardak province, a restive area west of Kabul. “There was a security meeting in the police training centre at which the interior minister and second vice president were present,” he said. “After the meeting was over and we were leaving, a rocket landed within a few hundred metres of the centre but nobody was injured,” he added.
