November 26, 2008	Wednesday	Ziqa'ad 27, 1429

KANDAHAR, Nov 25: Security forces have arrested 10 men suspected of involvement in a Taliban-ordered acid attack on schoolgirls in southern Afghanistan and some have confessed, authorities claimed on Tuesday.

The 10 were Afghans who reportedly had each been promised 100,000 Pakistani rupees by the Taliban in Pakistan to carry out the November 12 attack, deputy interior minister General Mohammad Daud told reporters.

Men on motorbikes used water pistols to spray acid into the faces of 15 girls and female teachers as they arrived at school in the southern city of Kandahar.

Most were given partial protection by their burqas, but one was seriously wounded in the face with some of the acid entering her eyes.

Daud said the men were all Afghans and had been arrested over several days. He did not say how many of them had confessed.

“They were led by Taliban... they were taking orders from the other side of the border from those who are leading terrorist attacks in Kandahar,” he said.

Six of the girls were treated in hospital and the one who suffered the worst injuries, a 17-year-old named Shamsia, was transferred to a military hospital in Kabul.

All of them except Shamsia were back at school, an AFP reporter in Kandahar said.

The attack on the girls drew wide condemnation including from President Hamid Karzai and US First Lady Laura Bush who described it last week “cowardly and shameful”.

A Taliban spokesman, Yousuf Ahmadi, said at the time that his group was not responsible.—AFP