ONE policeman was killed and four were wounded in Afghanistan yesterday when Taliban forces targeted a Kabul hotel for foreign contractors.

The Interior Ministry said that a suicide bomber had used a lorry full of explosives to breach the perimeter wall of the Northgate Hotel before three gunmen entered and started shooting.

The blast, in the eastern part of the Afghan capital, was followed by power cuts.

Kabul police chief Abdul Rahman Rahimi said that all the attackers had been killed and that none of the hotel residents had been harmed.

However, questions remain as to how the insurgents were able to bring a lorry loaded with explosives into the capital.

The Taliban warned that it would continue to target guesthouses occupied by foreigners, especially “US invaders.”

Fierce fighting continued at the weekend across Kunduz province and in Helmand, where the Taliban overran Kanasheen district on Friday and have seized much of Nad Ali district.