AFGHANISTAN TERROR ATTACKS BLAMED ON BIN LADEN GROUP.AN ASSASSINATION Assassination See also Murder. assassins Fanatical Moslem sect that smoked hashish and murdered Crusaders (11th—12th centuries). [Islamic Hist.: Brewer Note-Book, 52] Brutus conspirator and assassin of Julius Caesar. [Br. attempt on the Afghan leader Hamid Karzai Hamid Karzai (Persian and Pashto: حامد کرزي) (b. December 24, 1957) is the current President of Afghanistan, since December 7, 2004. He became the dominant political figure after the removal of the Taliban regime. and a Kabul bomb attack which killed at least 10 people were last night blamed on Osama bin Laden's terror network, al Qaida. Prime Minister Tony Blair sent a message to the Afghan president expressing his shock at the attempt on Mr Karzai's life, which happened just hours after a car bomb exploded in the capital. Witnesses said Mr Karzai was ``extremely lucky'' to have escaped unharmed after an Afghan security guard opened fire on his car as it left the governor's mansion in Kandahar, the former spiritual home of the Taliban. Mr Karzai had been attending the wedding of his brother in the southern city. The Kandahar governor, Gul Agha Sherzai Gul Agha Sherzai is the current Governor of Nangarhar province in Afghanistan. He previously served as Governor of Kandahar province, in the early 1990s and from 2001 until 2003. Biography Gul Agha was born by the name of Shafiq to a poor restaurant owner. , was wounded in the attack and witnesses saw him bleeding from the neck. A bodyguard sitting in the front of the car was also injured. Mr Karzai's American bodyguards opened fire in response to the shooting and three people were killed, including one who was wearing an Afghan military uniform. BBC BBC in full British Broadcasting Corp. Publicly financed broadcasting system in Britain. A private company at its founding in 1922, it was replaced by a public corporation under royal charter in 1927. reporter Lyse Doucet, who witnessed the attack, said Mr Karzai told her afterwards he was ``safe and sound''. Earlier, a powerful car bomb rocked a busy market area in the centre of Kabul, killing at least 10 people. It was the latest in a series of bomb attacks in the Afghan capital since August 15 and the first to claim lives. Afghan foreign minister Dr Abdullah Abdullah blamed both the assassination attempt and the bomb attack on al Qaida. He said: ``Terrorists are behind both attacks, there is no doubt about it. And terrorists in this region are led by Osama and his associates.'' Ronald Nash, the British ambassador to Afghanistan, said there was a possibility that bin Laden's terrorist network, blamed for the September 11 outrages, was responsible. But rejectionist groups like that connected to former Prime Minister Gulbuddin Hekmatyar may be responsible. Such groups, linked to the Taliban regime, did not accept the present peace. CAPTION(S): VICTIM: An Afghan boy injured in Kabul; KARZAI: Target |
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