Taliban launches major attacks

Attacks in two different Afghan provinces -- Nangarhar in the east and Kunduz in the north -- have left several people dead, including many of the assailants. In Saturday's first attack, a pre-dawn Taliban raid was thwarted by soldiers at a US military facility -- Forward Operating Base Fenty -- that is part of the Jalalabad airfield. An ISAF statement said that no Afghan National Army (ANA) troops or ISAF soldiers were killed in the incident. Eight attackers were killed, many of whom had been wearing ANA uniforms, Ahmad Zia Abdulzoi, a Nangarhar government spokesman, said. Zabiullah Mujahid, a Taliban spokesman, said there were 14 attackers and that 11 of them were killed, but the claim could not be independently corroborated. The day's second attack involved a motorcycle bomb that killed at least 10 people, including two policemen, according to the Afghan interior ministry. A bomb hidden in a motorbike exploded on a busy street in Kunduz's Imam Sahib district, killing seven civilians. The bomb was detonated just as a vehicle belonging to a police official drove past. The official -- Commander Mohammad Manan -- was killed along with one of his bodyguards and five civilians, Abdul Qayum Ebrahimi, Imam Sahib's police chief, said. Ebrahimi said they believed the bombers had targeted Manan.