KANDAHAR, Afghanistan, June 14 (UPI) -- Afghan troops conducted a large-scale manhunt Saturday, looking for hundreds of Taliban prisoners freed in a daring jail escape.
The estimated 1,100 prisoners were freed in a sophisticated attack Friday in which 30 Taliban militants used a truck bomb, suicide bombers and rockets to kill nine security guards and open the gates of the Sarposa prison in Kandahar, The Daily Telegraph reported.
"A massive operation is under way to find the escaped inmates," Qasim Hashimzai, Afghanistan's deputy justice minister, told the newspaper. "The Afghan security forces are searching for them within the city and along the main and secondary roads."
NATO forces were assisting the manhunt.
"Afghanistan national security forces and ISAF forces have cordoned off the area to re-establish security and recapture the escapees," Gen. Carlos Branco, a spokesman for the NATO's International Security Assistance Force, told the newspaper.
Taliban attackers concealed a bomb in a water tanker, deployed suicide bombers to destroy a mud wall inside the prison, crushing police and security guards, and followed that up with rockets launched by motorbike riders, the newspaper said.
