Assassination Plot Against Afghan President Karzai Foiled

KABUL — Afghanistan's intelligence agency said on Wednesday it had thwarted a plot to assassinate President Hamid Karzai after arresting a bodyguard and five people with links to the Haqqani network and al Qaeda.

The National Directorate of Security told a news conference the plotters had recruited one of Karzai's bodyguards in order to kill him.

It said those arrested were linked to the Haqqani network. The Haqqanis are one of three Taliban-allied insurgent factions fighting in Afghanistan and perhaps the most feared.