Assadabad: Taliban militants attacked a police patrol in eastern Afghanistan early Saturday, capturing a district police chief and two other officers, police said.
The patrol, which included Jamtullah Khan, the police chief of Shaigal district in Kunar province, on the border with Pakistan, was attacked after midnight, provincial police chief Khalilullah Ziayee said.
"Taliban abducted the district police chief along with two other policemen," he said.
It is the first abduction of a police chief by militants, Zemarai Bashary, Afghanistan's Interior Ministry spokesman.
Hundreds of Afghan businessmen, foreign journalists, politicians, aid and construction workers have been kidnapped in the past by militant groups or criminal gangs.
Most of the abductions have criminal motives or are carried out in a bid to secure release of fellow fighters from Afghan jails.
Bureau Report
First Published: Saturday, January 23, 2010, 14:40