Gunmen shoot dead Afghan member of parliament
KABUL (Reuters) - Two gunmen shot dead an Afghan parliamentarian near his home in the southern Afghan province of Kandahar, the Interior Ministry said on Saturday.
Habibullah Sanzenai, a member of the lower house of parliament for Kandahar and a tribal leader, was shot returning home overnight in the Zhari district of the province, a hotbed of Taliban militant activity.
Taliban insurgents have targeted members of parliament and tribal leaders in the past, but denied any involvement in the latest killing.
"This attack represents an assault on the democratic will of the Afghan people who voted in their millions for peace, stability and progress during historic elections in 2005," the U.N. special envoy for Afghanistan Kai Eide said in a statement.
Ten parliamentarians have been killed since the Afghan assembly was set up in 2005.
Five members of parliament were killed in a suicide attack that killed 72 people in the northern town of Baghlan in November last year. Another deputy died in an attempt to assassinate President Hamid Karzai at a military parade in April.
The Taliban have created a "resilient insurgency" in Afghanistan, the Pentagon said last week and violence has risen to new heights in recent weeks, despite the increased presence of foreign forces and more and better trained Afghan troops.
More than six years after U.S.-led and Afghan forces overthrew the Taliban in 2001 for refusing to hand over al Qaeda leaders behind the Sept. 11 attacks, many Afghans are growing weary with the ongoing violence and slow pace of development.
