5英国士兵阿富汗丧生

5名驻阿英军士兵3日下午在阿富汗南部赫尔曼德省一处警察检查站遭一名阿富汗警察枪杀。

国防部说，这名阿富汗警察在检查站内向英军士兵开枪后逃跑，枪击事件还造成多人受伤。死亡的5名英军士兵的职责是训练阿富汗警察部队。

From NPR News, it's ALL THINGS CONSIDERED. I'm Michele Norris.

ROBERT SIEGEL, host:

And I'm Robert Siegel.

A deadly attack on British soldiers in Afghanistan is raising concerns that Taliban insurgents may be infiltrating the Afghan forces. Today, an Afghan policeman killed five British soldiers. They've been training Afghan police units in the country's volatile southern region.

NPR's Rob Gifford has more from London.

ROB GIFFORD: According to a spokesman for the British Armed Forces, Lieutenant Colonel David Wakefield, the attack took place Tuesday afternoon in the north of Helmand province.

Lieutenant Colonel DAVID WAKEFIELD (Spokesman, British Armed Forces): What appears to have happened is that the soldiers concerned were mentoring Afghan national policemen. They were working inside and living inside an Afghan National Police checkpoint and it would appear that an individual Afghan National policeman possibly acting in conjunction with one other, started firing inside the checkpoint before fleeing from the scene.

GIFFORD: The man has not yet been captured. This latest incident comes a month after an Afghan policeman on patrol with U.S. soldiers turned his gun on the Americans, killing two of them. Training and operating jointly with Afghan police and soldiers is key to NATO's strategy of dealing with the spreading insurgency and ultimately allowing international forces to leave Afghanistan.

A senior British member of Parliament, Kim Howells, who had ministerial responsibility for Afghanistan last year, said the attack shows once again the contradictions of Britain's continuing presence there.

Mr. KIM HOWELLS (Senior Member of Parliament): We look as if we are fighting bravely, which we certainly are. But it also looks as if we're propping up a regime which is corrupt and incapable of providing the leadership which the Afghans need in order to shape their own future.

GIFFORD: British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said the attack could be the result of infiltration of the Afghan police by the Taliban. However, a spokesman for Afghan President Hamid Karzai called it an isolated attack by a crazy man.

Britain has some 9,000 troops in Afghanistan. Tuesday's fatalities brought the total number who've died there to 229.

Peter Galbraith is a former senior official at the United Nations mission in Afghanistan, who was dismissed by the U.N. after calling attention to fraud in the country's presidential election. He said, given the loose recruitment process for Afghan police, the shootings had not surprised him.

Mr. PETER GALBRAITH (Former Deputy United Nations Envoy, Afghanistan): I won't quite say it's inevitable, but it's not surprising. The process of police training and recruiting has been very rushed. There isn't a lot of vetting of police before they're hired. And actually, in the recent months, they shortened the training program from eight weeks to five weeks because they wanted to get more police boots on the ground in advance of the elections.

GIFFORD: The commander of international forces in Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal, said the incident would not deter U.S. resolve to build a partnership with the Afghan national security forces and to provide for Afghanistan's future.

Rob Gifford, NPR News, London.