(2 Aug 2011)
1. Mid of building on fire; zoom out, AUDIO: gunfire
2. Wide of police on rooftop
3. Mid of police
4. Wide of police inside damaged building compound
5. Mid of government militia member shooting, AUDIO: gunfire
6. Mid of police on rooftop
7. Wide of damaged building, pan to rubble and hole in ground
8. Mid of crater in ground caused by explosion
9. Afghan security forces carrying dead body wrapped in blanket
10. Various of Afghan security forces at site of attack
11. Blood on the ground
12. Various of debris on ground
13. Pan of damaged guest house compound
14. Various broken guest house windows
STORYLINE:
A suicide bomber blew up his car outside a small residential hotel frequented by foreigners in Afghanistan''s Kunduz city just after dawn on Tuesday, killing four guards.
Two other militants stormed the hotel and engaged the Afghan police in a two-hour gunbattle.
The Taliban claimed responsibility for the assault - the latest in a rising number of attacks in northern Afghanistan.
The explosion rocked the neighbourhood around the house, according a provincial spokesman.
The hotel burned and several nearby buildings were damaged.
Flames could be seen shooting up an exterior wall as police contained the area.
Four Afghan building guards were killed and 10 other people, including an Afghan policeman, were wounded, the spokesman said.
Foreigners staying at the two-storey hotel escaped through the rear of the building, he said.
A provincial police spokesman said German aid workers often stayed in the house, but that it was not clear who the foreigners staying there when the attack took place were.
The Interior Ministry said the house was used by GIZ, a German development and assistance organisation that contracts mostly with the German government.
A Taliban spokesman said in a text message to The Associated Press that the assailants had attacked a "German intelligence centre and security company."
Fighting has been focused in southern and eastern Afghanistan, but insurgents have been conducting a rising number of attacks in the once-peaceful north.
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