From the BBC:
Afghan clash 'kills police chief'A BBC update, later today, says:The provincial police chief and at least eight other police have been killed in a clash with US-trained Afghan guards in Kandahar, reports say.
The clash is said to have erupted after the guards, who are employed by US special forces, tried to remove an Afghan prisoner from a civic building.
The situation remains confused, with Kandahar city closed off.
Kandahar province is a Taliban stronghold, but there is no suggestion the Taliban were involved. ...
Gun battle
The guards are said to have tried to free one of their colleagues who was being kept prisoner at the prosecutor's office in Kandahar City. ...
The BBC in Afghanistan has been told that what began as a fist fight with police turned into a gun battle.
Ahmad Wali Karzai, head of Kandahar's provincial council and a brother of Afghan President Hamid Karzai, confirmed the incident.
"The police chief for Kandahar, the head of the city's criminal department and seven other police were killed in the clash," he told Reuters news agency.
Afghan guards held after shootoutForty-one US-trained Afghan guards have been arrested after a shootout in which Kandahar's provincial police chief was killed, the regional governor says.
Thoryalai Wesa says the guards will be sent from the southern province to the capital Kabul for trial.
Up to eight other policemen were killed after the guards, who are employed by US security forces, entered the prosecutor's office in Kandahar city.
They were trying to free colleagues held in the building, the BBC was told.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai said he "seriously condemns this action", describing it as a "serious blow to governance-building".
Gun battle
In a statement, Mr Karzai's office described what had happened.
"Armed men from one of the private security firms based in Kandahar tried to free two criminals - they attacked the local prosecutor's office," it said.
"The police chief of Kandahar and the head of the criminal investigation department resisted them - these guards opened fire" and killed them, it went on.
The statement said three others were also killed, although other reports put the total at nine.
The police chief has been named as Matiullah Qatay and the head of the criminal investigation department as Abdul Khaliq Hamdam.
The US military spokesman in Kabul, Col Greg Julian, confirmed to the AFP news agency that there had been "an incident" but did not have details.
Some witnesses had said US forces were at the scene of the incident, but this is unconfirmed.
...
The BBC's Martin Patience in Kabul says that Afghan guards are often employed at coalition military bases across the country.
They are paid and trained by the US. While the guards are recognised by the Afghan government, they do not come under their command.
Locals often refer to these guards as Afghan special forces as they are well-trained and well-armed, our correspondent says.
petrel
U.S. dismayed at Afghan release of drug smugglers
Wed Jul 15, 2009 10:33pm IST
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Afghan President Hamid Karzai's recent pardon of five convicted heroin smugglers is a disappointing setback to Kabul's U.S.-backed fight against the narcotics trade, the State Department said on Wednesday.
A spokesman for Karzai said last week the five pardons took place several months ago after the intercession of tribal chiefs, long a tradition in such matters in Afghanistan.
One of those released was a close relative of Deen Mohammad, who is running Karzai's campaign for re-election in the Aug. 20 presidential poll, a source with knowledge of the case said. The man was jailed for more than a decade in 2007 for smuggling more than 220 lbs (100 kg) of heroin.
"It is disappointing ... when successfully prosecuted traffickers are later released, as has occurred recently," the State department said in a statement.
"This undermines the work of the Afghan Ministries of the Interior and Counter Narcotics," it said.
The State Department said the U.S. Department of Justice, had given some $6 million to develop Afghanistan's Criminal Justice Task Force, a body set up in May 2005 to investigate and prosecute leading drug traffickers.
Karzai has been leading Afghanistan since the removal of the Taliban after a U.S.-led invasion in 2001 and won the country's first presidential poll three years later.
He has been under fire from Western leaders over poor governance, endemic corruption and for the booming drugs trade since the Taliban's fall.
Afghanistan is the biggest opium poppy producer in the world, with opium also funding the Taliban-led insurgency.