At least 50 killed as Taliban militants storm court

Updated

Nine Taliban suicide bombers have killed 44 people in an attack on a courtroom in western Afghanistan where 10 of their comrades were on trial.

Causing the biggest death toll in a single attack since 2011, a group of militants strapped with explosives stormed the governor's compound in Farah province, near the border with Iran.

They infiltrated the area disguised as Afghan soldiers, with nine detonating suicide bombs while the others engaged security forces in a long-running gun battle.

Thirty-four of the dead were civilians, the rest Afghan security forces, the governor's spokesman Abdul Rahman Zhwandai said.

A spokesman for the Afghan interior ministry said almost 100 people had been injured.

Farah hospital doctor Wakil Ahmad said medics were treating the wounded.

The Taliban said all 10 of its fighters who were on trial were freed.

"We sent several warnings to those in the Farah government, telling them not to work there," Taliban spokesman Qari Yousuf Ahmadi said.

It is the single deadliest attack in Afghanistan since December 2011, when a bomb tore apart a Shiite shrine in Kabul, killing 80 people.

It again raises concerns about the ability of Afghan forces to keep the country secure after western troops pull out in 2014.

Farah province, where United States and Italian troops are stationed, saw a sharp deterioration in security last year, with increased targeting of government officials and a regrouping of insurgent networks, according to the Afghanistan Analysts Network (AAN).

The vast distances between towns in Farah, sandwiched between Helmand and Herat, may allow for more Taliban gains in the near future, AAN said in a report last month

Civilian casualties in the NATO-led war, now in its 12th year, decreased in 2012 after rising for five years, according to the United Nations.

More than 80 per cent of civilian casualties are caused by insurgents.

ABC/wires

Topics: unrest-conflict-and-war, terrorism, afghanistan

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