Afghanistan construction workers killed in camp attack

Nine building contractors and a policeman have been killed by insurgents in an attack on a camp in western Afghanistan, officials say.

The contractors were working on a foreign-funded road building project in Herat province.

Police say Taliban militants armed with rocket propelled guns and automatic weapons attacked the camp.

A separate assault saw five people, including women and children, killed by a roadside bomb in Helmand province.

Correspondents say road building projects have been attacked in the past and violent incidents of this kind have increased as Nato prepares to withdraw combat troops in 2014.

The workers killed in the latest attack were building a 52km (32 mile) stretch of road linking two provinces.

Their camp was attacked as they slept in the early hours of Saturday, provincial police spokesman Abdul Rauf Ahmadi told AFP.

No group has claimed responsibility for the assault.

Five members of the same family were killed in the Marjah district of southern Helmand province when their van struck a roadside bomb, according to the Associated Press news agency.

By the end of 2014, all foreign combat troops are due to have left Afghanistan to be replaced – if approved by the Afghan government – by a smaller force that will only train and advise.