Taliban insurgents tunnel through prison walls
At least 480 prison inmates have escaped Sarposa prison in Kandahar overnight on Monday, after Taliban insurgents dug a 1,000-foot tunnel underneath the facility. The breach was only discovered at 4:00 a.m., a half hour after all the prisoners escaped. Mohammed Abdullah, an inmate who spoke to the Associated Press on the phone after the escape, said that he and his accomplices were given copies of the cell keys from “friends,” suggesting the cooperation of prison guards. Militants began digging the tunnel about 5 months ago from a house near the prison complex, finally breaking through the prison walls around 11 p.m. on Sunday. Waheed Omar, a spokesman for Afghan President Hamid Karzai, said “a prison break of this magnitude of course points to a vulnerability.” Many of the 480 escaped inmates are Taliban fighters.