NATO says 1 service member killed in attack on Kabul base

The Camp Integrity assault followed a suicide bombing at a police academy on Friday evening that killed and wounded more than 40 people, the Afghan Interior Ministry said on Saturday.

A truck heavily packed with explosive materials detonated in the Shah Shahid area of the capital in the middle of the night when people were home sleeping, according to the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA).

No one has yet claimed responsibility for the explosion, though officials have indicated they believed the Taliban were behind it. The Taliban often do not claim to have organized attacks that kill large numbers of civilians, especially women and children.

A coalition base which houses American Special Operations Forces outside Kabul was the target of a complex attack by insurgent forces Friday, U.S. officials said.

The Taliban are in the midst of a leadership dispute following last week’s appointment of Mullah Akhtar Mansour as new leader. A police source said the final tally was higher – 26 killed and 28 wounded. Mansour, who had previously been seen as open to peace talks, pledged to continue the insurgency that has killed and wounded thousands this year. “I think that was a little over-optimistic”.

North Atlantic Treaty Organisation spokesman Col. Brian Tribus says Saturday that the attack on Camp Integrity, on Kabul’s outskirts, left two insurgents dead.

The NATO-led Resolute Support (RS) mission generally do not disclose identities and nationalities of the deceased service members, saying “It is Resolute Support policy to defer casualty identification procedures to the relevant national authorities”.

There appears to be no easing in the intensity of the fighting between the Taliban and Afghan forces, which has caused nearly 5,000 civilian casualties this year, according to a recent report by the United Nations.