Suicide attackers strike Afghan city, sparking gun battles

A seventh attacker detonated a car rigged with explosives near a police rapid-reaction force, wounding two policemen, the ministry said.

Zemeri Bashary, Interior Ministry spokesman, said all the attackers were killed, but the Defense Ministry later said an eighth attacker may have escaped. The ministry said no government forces were killed, but 14 people were wounded - 11 civilians and three police.

The attack occurred five days after Taliban militants launched near-simultaneous assaults in Gardez, about 50 miles northwest of Khost, and in the eastern city of Jalalabad. Six Afghan police and intelligence officers and eight militants died in the two attacks.

Though the three attacks did not kill large numbers of Afghan or US security forces, they showed the tenuous security situation in Afghanistan’s countryside. Such attacks grab headlines in Afghanistan and raise the question of whether voters can safely go to polls.

The US envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, Richard Holbrooke, alluded to those concerns, saying yesterday it was “extraordinary’’ to hold an election in the middle of war. He said the vote faces “many complex challenges,’’ including security issues and access to polls for women. Authorities need a respectable turnout for the results to appear credible here and in countries supporting the government.

Holbrooke met separately with President Hamid Karzai and his top two challengers - Abdullah Abdullah, former foreign minister, and Ashraf Ghani, former finance minister.

Abdullah told Holbrooke that he is struggling to fight Karzai’s built-in advantage as president, with government assets at his disposal.

Abdullah noted a recent election commission report that said 70 percent of election coverage on the country’s state TV channel goes to Karzai. “That’s a very worrying sign,’’ Abdullah said. “All the ministers, the main ones, are out doing campaign work.’’

Holbrooke said he was “concerned’’ over reports of state media bias. Karzai’s campaign has denied that the president is using government tools to campaign.

Karzai is believed to be the favorite to win the presidency, but he must win more than 50 percent on Aug. 20 to avoid a runoff. Analysts say it is likely Karzai will win unless the almost 40 challengers rally behind a single opposition candidate.

Holbrooke and US Ambassador Karl Eikenberry toured the election commission and watched Afghans enter voter registrations into computers.