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Three people were killed in an attack on the U.S. Consulate in Herat, the main city in western Afghanistan, early on Friday morning. The Taliban has claimed responsibility for the shooting rampage and car bombing, the AP reported.
Details from reports differ. Herat police chief General Rahmatullah Safi said a police officer and a translator had been killed, the AP said, while U.S. officials said all members of the consulate staff had been accounted for. It is also believed that at least five insurgents had been killed.
The attack started at either 5:30 a.m. and 6 a.m., depending on reports. A truck carrying insurgents drove up to the consulate and the men inside opened fire with machine rifles and possibly rocket-propelled grenades, attacking the Afghan Protective forces outside the gates. Then a bomb inside the vehicle, located 60 meters from the gate, was detonated.
Some reports indicated that a translator was among the killed, though it was later believed that the victim may have been a private security guard working on the compound, the AP reported. An Afghan police officer was also killed. Reuters reported that two policemen and one security guard had been killed.
Four insurgents also died in the attacks, as did the suicide car bomber, the AP said. At least 17 people were injured, Reuters reported.
Safi also said the attackers failed to breach the compound, and that U.S. special forces were sent in to secure it.
The attack comes just two days after the U.S. commemorated the twelfth anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center in New York.
