Gordon Brown: ''We must not allow ourselves to give up what the Afghan Taliban fear most: that we will have a strong Afghan security force that is Afghan-based and is able to face them."
KABUL, AFGHANISTAN - British officials on Wednesday said a rogue Afghan policeman fatally shot five British soldiers at a checkpoint in the volatile south, raising concerns about the possible infiltration of local security forces by militants.
Zemeri Bashary, spokesman for the Afghan Interior Ministry, confirmed that the assailant was wearing a police uniform but said it was too soon to say whether he was a member of the force.
The latest deaths raised the number of British troops killed since the 2001 invasion to 229 and were likely to fuel debate about the country's continued involvement in the war. Britain is the second-largest contributor of forces to Afghanistan after the United States, with 9,000 troops.
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Concerns have been raised before about the quality of the Afghan National Police, some of whose members have been accused of drug trafficking, corruption and other abuses. The shooting happened a month after an Afghan policeman turned his gun on U.S. troops during a joint patrol in Wardak Province, killing two of them.
There were two similar incidents last year. In October 2008, a policeman threw a grenade and opened fire on a U.S. foot patrol, killing one soldier. The previous month, a policeman opened fire at a police station, killing a soldier and wounding three before he was fatally shot.
"The problem could get more challenging as we try to accelerate recruiting, so we will have to think hard about finding ways to prevent future recurrences," said Michael O'Hanlon, a security expert with the Brookings Institution in Washington. "It argues for steps like creating biometric databases and even more carefully screening applicants."
A key part of the U.S. and NATO exit strategy in Afghanistan is to build competent army and police forces that can eventually take over security responsibilities.