gubbi
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India to reopen Kabul mission: report
(AFP) 9 hours ago
NEW DELHI India is to reopen a medical mission in the Afghan capital Kabul that was hit by militant suicide attacks in February, a report in New Delhi said Wednesday.
Nine Indians were killed in one of the deadliest Taliban strikes on foreigners in Kabul. A total of 16 people died and 20 were critically injured when suicide bombers targeted two guesthouses in the Afghan capital.
India blamed Pakistan-based militants for targeting the medical mission in a power struggle between the two rival countries in Afghanistan that many analysts fear will erupt into a "proxy war" when foreign troops withdraw.
"The medical mission in Kabul will resume full-scale operations shortly," an anonymous source told the Times of India. "The staff who had been injured are being replaced."
India suspended medical aid and a number of teaching programmes in Afghanistan after the attack and Indian businesses and charities were reported to have slashed staff over fears they would be targeted by militants.
Indian interests in Afghanistan have been repeatedly targeted. Its embassy was bombed in October last year and on July 7, 2008.
The New Delhi government believes the attacks on its medical mission on February 26 were launched by Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), the same group that it blames for the Mumbai attacks in November 2008.
India, which has repeatedly urged the global community to "stay the course" in Afghanistan, is worried that Pakistan and the Islamist Taliban will assume key roles once international forces pull out.