Security Scrutinized After Taliban Kills Three Americans in Kabul, Afghanistan

Security measures and personnel are being scrutinized following news that three American citizens were among the 21 persons killed by “Taliban militants” in the Friday night attack on a restaurant in Kabul, Afghanistan.

Additionally, two British citizens, two Canadians, “the International Monetary Fund head of mission, and the restaurant’s Lebanese owner” were among the dead. 

According to AFP, the attacks happened in “one of the most secure districts of Kabul.” It is surrounded by “a series of checkpoints known as the ‘ring of steel,'” which were put in place in 2009. That three separate militants were able to evade “armed police tasked with searching people and vehicles” has already resulted in the suspensions of three police chiefs in the Afghan police force. A larger investigation has now been launched.

Twenty-seven-year-old Lexie Kamerman was one of the three Americans killed. According to the Daily Mail, she “took [a] job at the American University of Afghanistan to help young women of Afghanistan get an education.” 

One of Kamerman’s colleagues from the American University was also killed, as was another “U.S. victim identified by the United Nations as a Somali-American.”

Follow AWR Hawkins on Twitter @AWRHawkins.