Several dead in protests in eastern Afghanistan

Several people were killed when a demonstration broke out in eastern Afghanistan on Thursday after Taliban authorities ordered houses cleared to make way for a building construction, a provincial official said.

The Taliban authorities had ordered residents to vacate the land on the road between provincial capital Jalalabad and the border with Pakistan to make way for a new customs building, said Arafat Mohajer, the head of the information and culture department for the Torkham border point.

“The residents of the area created chaos in response,” said Mohajer, and in clashes one Taliban official was killed as well as “a number of people who were occupying the land (illegally)”.

The demonstration and clashes had blocked the key road from Jalalabad to Torkham, Mohajer added.