Afghan Vice President Karim Khalili and Interior Minister Besmullah Mohammadi escaped unhurt after a rocket attack targeted a police centre in central Afghanistan on Wednesday, officials said.
Provincial spokesman Shahidullah Shahid said the attack happened in the Chaki Wardak district of Wardak province, a restive area west of Kabul.
“There was a security meeting in the police training centre at which the interior minister and second vice president were present,” he said.
“After the meeting was over and we were leaving, a rocket landed within a few hundred metres of the centre but nobody was injured,” he added.
Deputy interior ministry spokesman Najib Nikzad added: “One mortar rocket fired by the enemies of Afghanistan landed where the interior minister, second vice president and provincial officials had gathered to inaugurate the new police training centre.”
Khalili, one of President Hamid Karzai’s two vice presidents, was born in Wardak province.
Taliban-led insurgents frequently launch attacks on senior Afghan government officials as well as the police and army but it is relatively rare for two such senior figures to be targeted.
