2 Italian doctors among 9 held in alleged Afghan hospital murder plot

2 Italians among 9 held in alleged Afghan plot

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan — Two Italian doctors are among nine people detained in an alleged plot to kill an Afghan provincial governor, officials said Saturday.

Their detentions follow the discovery of suicide bomb vests, hand grenades, pistols and explosives in a hospital storeroom in Lashkar Gah, the capital of the southern province of Helmand, a spokesman for the provincial government said.

Police were tipped off about a plot to kill Helmand’s governor during a future visit to the hospital, spokesman Daud Ahmadi said.

Upon questioning, the storeroom’s supervisor implicated others at the hospital, eventually leading investigators to the two Italians, Ahmadi said.

There was no immediate indication of whether any other evidence implicated the two, and their names were not immediately available.

Ahmadi said the suspects also included another foreigner, but that person’s nationality wasn’t immediately known. The six others were all Afghans working at the hospital as clerks, guards or translators, he said.

Investigators believe the nine were linked to the Taliban insurgency and that the plan had been hatched at a meeting in the Pakistan city of Quetta, Ahmadi said. He said the plotters planned to carry out a suicide bombing in Lashkar Gah, then wait until the governor, Gulab Mangul, came to the hospital to visit the injured to attack him with grenades, pistols and explosives. No other details were available.

Taliban are active in the province.

Calls to the Italian Embassy in Kabul rang unanswered Saturday.