Prison break

Sobering news from that other war, via CNN: A suicide attack by Taliban forces on a prison in Afghanistan frees hundreds of Taliban suspects captured over the last six years. I apologize for the glibness of this next remark, but the description of the incident sounds like something out of a Mad Max movie:

The militants used suicide truck bombs loaded with about two tons of explosives to blast holes in the mud brick walls of the Soviet-era prison, a Taliban spokesman said.

A gun and rocket battle between the militants and prison guards lasted several hours and ended with dozens of militants rushing inside on motorcycles to free all prisoners inside — including about 400 Taliban fighters, the Taliban spokesman said.

This was the main prison in the province of Kandahar, located on the western outskirts of the city of Kandahar, a reported Taliban stronghold. The Washington Post reports that the prison is controlled by badly-paid and undertrained Afghan police and a corrupt Interior Ministry.

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