KHOST, Nov 12: Suspected Taliban militants killed three policemen and a former district chief in a mosque in fresh attacks in Afghanistan, officials said on Saturday.

The latest violence came as the election authority announced it had finalised the make-up of the country’s first democratically elected parliament in more than three decades.

One policeman was killed and six other people wounded in a gun battle that erupted around midnight on Friday when militants attacked a district police headquarters in Khost province, an interior ministry spokesman said.

The fight in Bak district, around 140 kilometres southeast of Kabul, lasted about two hours, spokesman Yousuf Stanizai said.

“One policeman was martyred, three other police, two soldiers and an employee were wounded...,” he said.

A block of the building was destroyed and another damaged, a Bak district police officer said. Two police vehicles and two motorcycles were also burnt, he said.

Twelve shops nearby were also set alight and damaged, a resident said.

Stanizai blamed the attack on “the enemies of Afghanistan”, a term Afghan officials use to refer to loyalists of the Taliban.

The militants were also blamed for shooting dead two policemen on patrol late on Friday in southern Helmand province.

“It is the work of Taliban,” provincial police chief Abdul Rahman said.

Also in Helmand, gunmen burst into a mosque and shot dead former district chief, Abdul Hakim Khan, before fleeing on two motorbikes, provincial governor Shir Mohammad Khan said.

Twelve alleged militants were arrested in a security sweep after the shooting, he said.

In an address to the conference on Saturday, President Hamid Karzai called on former members of the Taliban to accept an offer of amnesty and work for peace.—AFP