Afghan officials arrested a militant in a police uniform who was part of a three-man attack on Kabul's main luxury hotel that killed eight, officials said yesterday.

A militant connected to a notorious insurgent in Pakistan was accused of masterminding the assault.

Police said they also found a video made by two of the attackers in a home in Kabul, where they arrested two men. A fourth man - believed to have driven the attackers to the Serena Hotel - was arrested in eastern Afghanistan while trying to flee to Pakistan.

Amrullah Saleh, the head of Afghanistan's intelligence service, said three militants stormed the Serena Hotel on Monday evening. A guard shot and killed one attacker at the gate to the hotel's parking lot, which triggered his suicide vest.

A second attacker blew himself up near the entrance to the hotel's lobby, and the third attacker made it inside the hotel and shot his way through the lobby and toward the gym, Saleh said. The third attacker was arrested Monday.

The three militants stormed Kabul's most popular luxury hotel just after 6 pm, hunting down Westerners who had cowered in a gym. More than 30 US soldiers in a half-dozen Humvees rushed to the hotel, and security personnel from the nearby US Embassy ran to the scene.

Blood covered the lobby floor as gunfire rang out, witnesses said.

Saleh said the attack was masterminded by Mullah Abdullah, a close ally of Siraj Haqqani, a well-known militant leader thought to be based in Pakistan's tribal area in Miran Shah, the main town in North Waziristan. The US military has a $200,000 bounty out on Haqqani.

Police arrested a man named Humayun, allegedly a key link to Abdullah, in eastern Afghanistan yesterday as he was trying to flee to Pakistan, Saleh said, accusing him of supplying the assailants with weapons, explosives and suicide vests and driving them to the hotel.

Saleh showed a picture taken from the hotel's security cameras showing a gunman in a police uniform inside the hotel's lobby, apparently the third attacker. He was apprehended 15 to 20 minutes after the attack began, he said.

"The third person, after killing a number of the guests, maybe he changed his mind for some reason, he didn't detonate himself," Saleh said. "He changed his clothes and later when security forces searched the premises, he was arrested."

Authorities raided a house in Kabul early yesterday where the alleged attackers had spent the night before the attack. Police found a video showing two of the assailants, identified as Farouq and Salahuddin, saying they were ready to die. The owner of the house and his brother were arrested.

"I commit this suicide attack for Allah," the video showed the attacker named Farouq saying. He blew himself up during the attack.

Salahuddin was captured and provided information that led to the arrest of Humayun, Saleh said. The official spokesman of the Kabul Serena said the hotel was closed for repairs, including damage caused by bullets and grenades.

"This will certainly affect our business," said the spokesman, who asked not to be identified citing company policy. "The hotel was helping drive business in Afghanistan by creating a safe haven for international businessmen that wanted to invest and work here. This will dent that confidence."

There was confusion over the death toll. Saleh said three Americans and a French woman were among those killed, but the US Embassy said only one American citizen died. The French embassy was not aware of any French casualties.

The Serena spokesman said three hotel employees and two guards were killed during the attack. Officials have said an American citizen and a Norwegian reporter also died, and the Philippines Foreign Affairs Department said a Filipina spa supervisor wounded in the attack died yesterday, bringing the death toll to eight.

Agencies

(China Daily 01/16/2008 page12)