At least eight Afghan police and one foreigner are believed to have been killed after the Taliban marked the anniversary of Afghanistan's independence from Britain with an elaborate, multi-phased attack on the British Council building in Kabul.
The assault on the compound in the west of the city began when a suicide car bomber detonated a vehicle at the front gate of the compound.
Witnesses in nearby shops said several heavily armed insurgents then rushed out of a side street shouting, firing in the air and racing towards the open gate. Afghan officials believed the number of attackers was between two and four.
All British nationals caught up in the attack are now safe, Foreign Office minister Alistair Burt said.
Jumadin, a worker at a nearby petrol station, said the force of the initial blast was enough to throw him across the ground. "I thought I was going to die," he said.
"When the policemen rushed to the area from the police district at least three were shot dead near the building."
At midday the relatively upmarket Kabul neighbourhood resembled a war zone.
Six hours after the beginning of the attack, fighting continued between the attackers and security forces, including British troops. Loud explosions and long bursts of gunfire could be heard from within the building, circling helicopters released counter-missile flares and a medical evacuation helicopter briefly landed and then departed again just 50m from the site.
After an initial period when the fighting appeared to have ended, a volley of machine-gun fire sent British soldiers ducking behind their armoured vehicles.
With the injured rushed to different hospitals and the building still not cleared, estimates of the number killed and wounded varied wildly. The interior ministry said it thought 12 people had been injured and eight killed, all of them either police or private security guards.
The heavily fortified compound is usually protected by a mixed force of Afghan and Nepali guards.
"It is a sad fact that once again an attack aimed at the international community has killed Afghans," Burt said. "This attack, against people working to help build a better future for Afghanistan, will not lessen the UK's resolve to support the Afghan people."
British soldiers rushed to the UK government's cultural and educational mission, joining Afghan police and soldiers and the New Zealand SAS, but more than six hours after the attack at least one insurgent was thought to be at large in the compound.
The area hosts not only the British Council, but also two of the country's top politicians – the leader of the opposition and one of President Hamid Karzai's vice-presidents.
Zabiullah Mujahid, a Taliban spokesman reached by phone, said the target was both the British Council and a guesthouse that he claimed, it would appear incorrectly, was located in the same compound.
"We attacked the buildings because we want to remind the British that we won our independence from them before and we will do it again," he said.
Although Afghanistan was not a formal Biritsh colony at the time, the country celebrates the end of the Third Anglo-Afghan war in 1919, when the country won the right to pursue a foreign policy independent of the British Raj.
The Afghan government, which has in the past tried to restrict initial coverage of terrorist attacks, appeared to put restraints on at least one television channel called Afghan News, which abruptly dropped its reporting to switch to patriotic songs.
Journalists were also ordered to stop taking photos when what appeared to be a seriously wounded New Zealand special forces soldier was stretchered out of the building and loaded on to the medevac helicopter.
New Zealand's SAS, which runs a rapid reaction force for Kabul, also suffered casualties during June's siege of the Intercontinental hotel. One soldier suffered a chest wound while the other broke his jaw in the fighting.
In a statement, the chief executive of the British Council, Martin Davidson, said: "We are deeply saddened at the events that have taken place in Kabul and our thoughts are with the families of those injured or killed in this appalling attack.
"We have 25 Afghan appointed staff none of whom are based at the compound and none of whom are physically affected by incident.
"Our work in Kabul and elsewhere in the country makes a vital contribution not just to building the post conflict Afghanistan but also to creating relationship of trust between the people of Afghanistan and the UK."
As the fighting was taking place Karzai, senior officials and diplomats marked the anniversary with a small ceremony inside the walls of his heavily fortified palace compound on the other side of Kabul.
by Jon Boone taken from http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/aug/19/british-council-attack-taliban-gunman
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