VARIOUS: SUICIDE CAR BOMBER BLOWS UP A BUS FULL OF GERMAN PEACEKEEPING SOLDIERS ON JALALABAD ROAD / PRESIDENT KARZAI SEMINAR AT OXFORD UNIVERSITY.

Record ID: 358649

  • Title: VARIOUS: SUICIDE CAR BOMBER BLOWS UP A BUS FULL OF GERMAN PEACEKEEPING SOLDIERS ON JALALABAD ROAD / PRESIDENT KARZAI SEMINAR AT OXFORD UNIVERSITY.
  • Date: 6th June 2003
  • Summary: (W4) KABUL, AFGHANISTAN, (JUNE 8, 2003) (REUTERS) 1. WS: TRAFFIC ON JALALABAD ROAD THE DAY AFTER THE BOMBING. 0.09 2. MLV: EXPLOSION SITE AND CHILDREN PICKING UP SCRAP METAL. 0.16 3. TRACK: A GERMAN ISAF (INTERNATIONAL SECURITY ASSISTANCE FORCE) TANK RUSHING PAST ON THE ROAD. 0.23 4. MV: OF SCRAP METAL POSSIBLY FROM THE BUS DESTROYE
  • Embargoed: 21st June 2003 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: KABUL, AFGHANISTAN, AND LONDON, ENGLAND, UNITED KINGDOM
  • City:
  • Country: Afghanistan England United Kingdom
  • Reuters ID: LVAE37DV3QIK940J5OFYI0VFWJZ
  • Story Text: The international peacekeeping force in Kabul has said
    it received warnings of a security threat before a suspected
    suicide car bomber blew up a bus full of German soldiers,
    killing four, on Saturday (June 7).



    Peacekeepers in Kabul admitted they received security
    warnings before a suicide car bomber blew up a bus full of
    German soldiers, killing four and wounding 31.

    Six civilians were also killed including the driver of a
    yellow cab full of explosives who rammed his vehicle into the
    bus.

    Today the road to Jalalabad where the attack took place was
    opened but scraps of twisted metal were still visible off the
    roadside.

    Lieutenant-Colonel Thomas Lobbering, spokesman for the
    5,000-strong International Security Assistance Force for Kabul
    (ISAF), that the soldiers belonged to, told a news briefing
    on Sunday (June 8) that threats were received daily, making it
    difficult to predict which were real and which were false
    alarms.

    "As far as the threat of a car bomb is concerned these
    threat warning have being ongoing now for months and months,"
    he told the press briefing.

    Lobbering added that ISAF, led jointly by Germany and the
    Netherlands, had no intention of halting its operations in
    reaction to the worst attack against its force since their
    deployment following the fall of the Taliban regime in late
    2001.

    "The type of terrorist attack and the amount of the
    terrorists attack is in line with what we have been expecting
    and what we still expect -- I am sorry to say that -- for the
    upcoming future. On the other hand, let me make it absolutely
    clear; ISAF is here in Kabul because the situation is not yet
    stable and not yet one hundred percent safe," he added.

    This would be welcome news to President Hamid Karzai would
    only just recently on his trip to the United Kingdom was full
    of praise for the international peacekeeping force.

    At a seminar at St Anthony's college in Oxford University
    on Friday (June 6), Karzai warned of the consequences if ISAF
    were to leave.

    "If they leave Afghanistan today, we'll be in hell
    tomorrow. Various groups fighting each other, various
    countries trying to come back and join (in) Afghanistan," he
    told the student body.

    Late on Saturday, Afghan Defence Minister Mohammad Qasim
    Fahim told his German counterpart that the al Qaeda network
    once sheltered by the Taliban may have been behind the attack.

    Lobbering declined to comment on the al Qaeda link.

    Afghan officials have been quick to blame the network after
    previous attacks, but rarely produce solid evidence to back up
    their claims.

    The troops were on their way to the airport at the end of
    their assignments in Kabul. The bodies of the dead are
    expected to be flown back to Germany on Tuesday (June 10).




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