2 killed, 11 escape in brazen Afghan jailbreak

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) - A guard and a prisoner were killed and 11 inmates escaped early Sunday after explosives were smuggled in and detonated at a prison in western Afghanistan.

The blast went off shortly after 2 a.m., destroying a gate that allowed 19 prisoners to escape, Farah province's deputy governor Yonus Rasouli said. One prisoner died and three were wounded in an ensuing gunbattle with guards. Eight inmates were recaptured.

Gen. Abdul Makhtar, deputy for Afghanistan's prison department, said one seriously wounded guard later died.

Rasouli said 347 prisoners were being held in a building meant for only 86. He acknowledged that conditions were poor at many prisons around the country, but said there was no money to build better facilities.

The Taliban staged a sophisticated jailbreak that freed nearly 900 prisoners in June 2008 in the southern city of Kandahar.

One suicide bomber detonated a tanker truck full of explosives at the Kandahar prison gate, while a second bomber blasted an escape route through a back wall. Dozens of militants on motorbikes then attacked the facility.