Gen. Zmaray Paikan, the commander of the unit, disputed the Taliban account, saying that six rather than seven officers had abandoned the vehicle they were in after it broke down on the highway, and scattered. Two were rescued, and the others were missing. “We tried to call them, but their phones were switched off,” he said. “Hopefully they are somewhere with no network coverage.” The driver of the vehicle was held for questioning, he added.

In an unrelated episode, Mariam Koofi, a member of Parliament, was shot and wounded by an officer of the National Directorate of Security, the Afghan intelligence service, at her home in Kabul on Tuesday night, according to official accounts. She was in stable condition in a Kabul hospital with leg wounds.

Speaking on the condition of anonymity in line with policy, an Interior Ministry official said the shooting took place after Ms. Koofi had an argument with the officer. “He didn’t try to kill her,” the official said. “He just fired on the ground near her feet to prevent her from getting closer to him. She was accidentally shot twice in one of her legs.”

The official added that the National Directorate of Security officer had been arrested.

However, Ms. Koofi’s sister, a well-known women’s rights activist and politician, Fawzia Koofi, disputed that version, calling it an assassination attempt on her sister while she was in her car outside her home and office.

“Her bodyguard immediately responded to the shooting from inside the car,” she said. “The shooting did not happen as a result of a verbal argument.” She had no explanation for a possible motive.