MOSCOW, Dec28, Reuter: Rebel rocket and artillery attacks have killed about 20 people in Afghanistan, the Soviet news agency Tass reported on Wednesday.
The Rebels staged attacks on the capital, Kabul, and on a string of other towns across Afghanistan including Gardez, Herat, Ghazni and Kunduz to mark the ninth anniversary of the Soviet Military intervention in the country.
Tass, quoting Afghanistan’s Bakhtar News Agency, said about 20 people had been killed and many wounded on Tuesday in 300 attacks in Eastern Paktia Province alone.
Another report by Radio Moscow, quoting Kabul Radion, said 28 people have been killed in the past two days.
Bakhtar said rebels had seized control of the town of Kunar, near the Pakistani border, and were threatening to block movement of supplies in and out of Gardez, south of Kabul.
But insurgents who had been closing in on Ghazni, further west, had scaled down their attacks.
Moslem Guerrillas have frequently fired rockets at towns since Moscow began withdrawing its 100,000 troops last May under U.N. mediated accords signed in Geneva. But Tuesday’s attacks were the most reported by Kabulona single day.
In the northwest Pakistani town of Peshawar, rebels burnt a puppet effigy of Afghan President Najibullah and denounced Soviet Peace moves at a rally marking Moscow’s intervention. Moscow last month announced it was suspending the withdrawal of its troops from Afghanistan because the military situation had worsened.
But Chief Soviet negotiator Yuli Vorontsov has met Rebel leaders, Najibullah and deposed Afghan King Zahir Shah in a bid to bring the sides together before the February 15 deadline for the pullout.
Article extracted from this publication >> January 6, 1989
