Suspected Taliban Torch NATO Supplies In SW Pakistan

[Coventina]

Source: New York Times

CHAMAN, Pakistan (Reuters) - Suspected Taliban militants set fire to 18 container trucks carrying supplies for Western forces in neighboring Afghanistan in the Pakistani border town of Chaman, police said on Monday.

Some 300 trucks were parked near the border crossing in the country's southwest, as the border had been closed by Pakistani authorities since Friday in a row with their Afghan counterparts over the checking of trucks coming from landlocked Afghanistan.

"The attackers probably had planted explosives under one of the oil tankers which went off, setting others on fire," Abdul Rauf, a senior border police official, told Reuters. "Eighteen trucks have completely been destroyed."

Witnesses, however, said the militants lobbed a grenade onto the trucks, setting them on fire.

"They came on motorcycles. They first opened fire with guns, then threw a rocket-propelled grenade toward our vehicles and ran away," Akhtar Mohammad Niazi, a driver, told Reuters.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2009/08/31/world/international-us-pakistan-violence.html