Eleven police officers and two insurgents were killed in a rebel attack in western Afghanistan's Herat province Sept. 21. "We lost 11 policemen. They were attacked while on a patrol in a village near their headquarters in Salama Dam," said Herat Gov. Sayed Gul Chishti. The police were guarding the hydroelectric dam, which is being built by Indian engineers, when they came under attack by rebels loyal to Ghulam Mustafa, a former Mujahedeen commander "who has now joined the Taliban," Chishti said. Mustafa admitted his men killed the police but denied his links to the Taliban, in a telephone interview with the French AFP news agency. "I'm not with the Taliban. We killed 10 policemen. They were the ones attacking us first," the rebel commander told AFP. (AlJazeera, Sept. 21)

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