Gunmen Kidnap Un Official in Pakistan

A UN official was kidnapped by gunmen in south-west Pakistan yesterday, while in Afghanistan a suicide bomber killed 21 policemen, underlining the escalating violence in the two countries.

The White House has focused on Afghanistan and Pakistan as twin problems, with veteran diplomat Richard Holbrooke appointed envoy for both countries.

John Solecki, an American who has been head of the UN high commissioner for refugees office in Quetta for two years, was ambushed and kidnapped by armed men as he was being driven to work yesterday morning in Quetta, capital of Baluchistan province.

The assailants shot his driver, Syed Hashim, who died from his injuries in hospital. Hashim had worked for the UN for 18 years.

The government called the abduction a "dastardly terrorist act". But it was unclear whether the kidnapping was the work of Islamist militants, a criminal gang or Baluch nationalists.

While the focus of Islamist violence in Pakistan has been further north, in North-West Frontier province, Quetta is also home to Afghan Taliban fighters and, according to reports, their leaders.

Their influence in the city is growing, with women banned from restaurants under pressure from extremists.

"UNHCR's mission in more than 110 countries around the world, including in Pakistan, is aimed solely at easing the plight of refugees, displaced people and innocent civilians in a totally impartial and humanitarian manner," said António Guterres, head of the UNHCR in Geneva. "The targeting of those who help the world's most vulnerable people leaves all of us deeply shocked and saddened."

The UNHCR has worked in Quetta and North-West Frontier province since the 1980s. About 3 million Afghan refugees remain in Pakistan.

Last year, a US aid worker in Peshawar, the provincial capital, was shot and killed as he was going to work, while an American diplomat in the city was saved by her armored car when gunmen attacked.

Aid agencies and international organizations are increasingly reluctant to work in Pakistan as a result of suicide bomb attacks against international targets across the country.

In Afghanistan, a suicide bomber wearing a police uniform walked into a police training center and blew himself up yesterday, killing 21 officers and wounding at least 20.

The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack in Tarin Kot, the capital of Uruzgan province.

The Afghan police have suffered the greatest losses from the escalating insurgency, with some 870 killed in militant attacks last year.