Insider attack leaves six Afghan police officers dead

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Six Afghan policemen were killed in the early morning hours Saturday in an insider attack masterminded by a fellow officer and cook teamed up with insurgents, a police spokesman said.

The officer and cook shot dead two Afghan national police and were then joined by other insurgents, who killed four more officers in the Gereskh district of Helmand province in southern Afghanistan, according to Helmand police spokesman Farid Ahmad Farhangi.

However, there were contradictory accounts as a representative of the Helmand governor said the cook and police officer poisoned two officers and then were joined by Taliban fighters, according to the Associated Press.

The police officer was captured, but the cook and the Taliban fighters fled, though some were injured, Farhangi said.

The attack brought new attention to insurgents hiding inside the ranks of the Afghanistan security forces. At least 51 members of U.S.-led NATO forces have died in such attacks this year, raising suspicion about the loyalty of Afghan forces and injecting tension into relationships between Afghan and international troops. The Taliban also regularly attacks Afghan officers and bases as it seeks to undermine the force that will protect the country when international troops leave by the end of 2014.

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-- Ned Parker