Suicide bomber kills 3 NATO troops on day of violence in Afghanistan

KABUL, Afghanistan — A suicide bomber struck a joint patrol of NATO and Afghan forces near a large military base just outside the Afghan capital Sunday, killing at least three NATO service members and injuring three others, officials said, on a day that saw deadly violence across the country.

An Afghan soldier was killed in the eastern city of Jalalabad trying to stop a suicide bombing at a checkpoint, and in the south, the Taliban continued a bloody assault on the district of Chinarto, in Uruzgan province.

Lt. Col. Martin O’Donnell, a spokesman for the coalition, said the attack on NATO troops happened in the Charikar district of Parwan province, to the north of Kabul.

All three service members killed were from the Czech Republic, according to Lt. Gen. Ales Opata, the Czech army’s chief of general staff. NATO said one of the wounded was American and two were Afghan.

Col. Alozai Ahmadi, head of security coordination in Parwan, said those attacked had been on a routine patrol going after suspicious groups in the larger perimeter around the Bagram military base, about 5 miles from the site of the attack. He said the bomber was young, about 18.

“After the attack, four choppers arrived, two of them ambulances. Two others circled in the sky above,” said Ahmadi, whose forces were called to the site after the bombing. “Mud walls near the incident collapsed by the shock wave of the bomb.”

There are 173 Czech soldiers at Bagram as part of the 10th ACR Guard Company “to deflect hostile activities against the allied base,” according to the Czech army.

“My thoughts and prayers, along with those of all the 41 Resolute Support nations, are with the families and friends of our fallen and wounded service members, and our injured Afghan brothers and their families,” Gen. John W. Nicholson, the U.S. commander in Afghanistan, said in a statement issued on behalf of the coalition mission, which is known as Resolute Support.

Violence also continued elsewhere in the country. In Uruzgan province, officials said the Taliban had largely overrun the district of Chinarto, with the remaining government forces stuck in the Police Headquarters.

Akhtar Mohammad, police chief of the district, said that at least 36 soldiers had been killed in the district since the Taliban attacked there in large numbers Friday, and that the fighting was continuing.

“They burned the army base, and they blew up the newly built district governor’s compound,” Mohammad said.

In Jalalabad, struck by a recent wave of Islamic State group bombings, a suicide bomber tried to target a checkpoint of the Afghan army, which has taken over the security for the city.

One of the soldiers on duty identified the suicide bomber, and ran to wrestle him, but the bomber detonated his explosives. That soldier and two others were killed, according to Attaullah Khogyani, a spokesman for the provincial governor.

The soldier who tried to stop the suicide bomber was identified as Mohammed Omar, 23.

As Afghanistan’s security has deteriorated, with an Islamic State group faction adding to the chaos, President Donald Trump has increased the number of U.S. troops here — a move echoed by other NATO members, including Britain. About 14,000 U.S. troops are in Afghanistan, assisted by several thousand from NATO countries.

About 3,550 coalition troops have died in Afghanistan since the invasion in 2001, including more than 2,200 Americans. So far this year, four Americans and three service members from other coalition countries have been killed.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.