South Korean troops tasked with protecting the nation's civilian reconstruction team in Afghanistan have heightened their alert posture after last week's rocket attack, military officials here said Wednesday.
Unidentified assailants fired two rounds of rocket-propelled grenades toward a construction site on the night of June 30 (local time) in the northern province of Parwan, where South Korea's provincial reconstruction team (PRT) will be based.
There were 58 South Korean workers and some 60 local security guards on site at the time of the
attack, but officials said there were no injuries.
"Since the rocket attack, the troops have heightened their alert posture at the construction site by using thermal observation devices and night vision goggles," Col. Lee
Bung-woo, a spokesman for theJoint Chiefs of Staff, said.
"From tomorrow, they will conduct aerial patrols of the site one to two times a day in cooperation with the U.S. forces there," Lee told reporters. He added that the South's military was still investigating the identities of the assailants.
About 230 South Korean troops are stationed at the U.S. military's Bagram Air Base in Parwan
Province, about 15 kilometers from Charika, where the South Korean PRT base is currently under
construction. A final batch of 90 soldiers is scheduled to join the South Korean contingent in late August, bringing the total number of troops there to about 320.
Despite the attack, the PRT officially launched its mission last Thursday to help rebuild Afghanistan.
The team is expected to move from Bagram to the Charika base by the end of this year once the
construction is completed. South Korea plans to gradually expand the PRT to about 100 aid workers
and 40 police officers.
South Korea withdrew its military engineers and medics unit from Afghanistan in 2007 after a group of its church workers were kidnapped by Taliban forces, two of whom were killed.
South Korea said the pullout was previously planned and not linked with the kidnappings.