Afghan President Will Disband Private Guards

Afghan President Hamid Karzai listens during a press conference in Kabul, Afghanistan, Monday, Oct....

Afghan President Hamid Karzai listens during a press conference in Kabul, Afghanistan, Monday, Oct. 25, 2010. Karzai told reporters that once or twice a year Iran gives his office $700,000 to $975,000 for official presidential expenses. He said the U.S. has known about the Iranian assistance for years and that Washington also gives the palace "bags of money." (AP Photo/Allauddin Khan)

(AP)

In other developments Monday, four gunmen seized a Dutch aid worker and his Afghan driver in northern Afghanistan's Takhar province, said Provincial Governor Abdul Jabar Taqwa, quoting witnesses. The two were working with an aid group helping disabled people.

Dutch Foreign Ministry spokesman Bart Rijs confirmed that a Dutch man and his Afghan driver had been kidnapped, but gave few details.

Afghanistan is becoming increasingly dangerous for aid workers. In August, 10 members of a Christian medical team — six Americans, two Afghans, one German and a Briton — were ambushed and later killed by gunmen in neighboring Badakhshan province. Last month, a British woman working for a development organization was kidnapped in eastern Afghanistan and accidentally killed by U.S. forces during a failed Oct. 8 rescue attempt.

In southern Afghanistan, a raid by NATO soldiers and a subsequent airstrike killed 15 insurgents, NATO said.

Around a dozen gunmen on motorcycles fired on the international forces as they were preparing to destroy a bomb-making factory and weapons cache they found during a search of several compounds in the village of Maigan, the coalition said. Troops killed them and then called in the airstrike to destroy the compounds.

NATO has also been trying to kill or capture Taliban leaders in airstrikes and in joint ground operations with the Afghan army as they try to wrest back control of the southern provinces from the Taliban.

Residents say the push has resulted in patches of security in the south, but the insurgency has stepped up attacks in other parts of the country, including the north, which has traditionally been more stable.

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Associated Press writers Rahim Faiez in Kabul and Mirwais Khan in Kandahar, Afghanistan, contributed to this report.

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