UN evacuates non-essential staff after deadly attack on Kabul guesthouse

[eppur_se_muova]

Source: TimesOnline (UK)

Jeremy Page in Kabul

The United Nations started evacuating “non-essential” staff from Kabul today after the Taleban killed five of its foreign employees at an international guesthouse in the deadliest attack yet on the UN in Afghanistan.

Following an emergency meeting to review security, the UN stopped short of withdrawing completely from Afghanistan, as it did from Iraq after a massive truck bomb killed 22 people at its headquarters in Baghdad in 2003.

Kai Eide, the UN chief in Afghanistan, had pledged after the attack on Wednesday that the UN would not be deterred from its work in the country, which includes funding and helping to organise a presidential election run-off on November 7.

The official decision at today’s meeting was that individual UN agencies should decide whether to advise “non-essential” staff not involved in the run-off to take leave, according to two participants.



Read more: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/Afghanistan/article6895932.ece

---

It's the Times, so another source would be welcomed ... BBC reported the attack yesterday ... http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/8329140.stm