6:33pm UK, Monday January 18, 2010

David Williams, Sky News Online

Gun battles have raged on the streets of Kabul after the Taliban launched a wave of deadly suicide bombings in the Afghan capital.

A child, a soldier and a police officer were among five people to have died in one of the worst insurgent attacks on the city.

Police sealed off the city centre and sent snipers onto rooftops after the blasts, which the militants said were aimed at the presidential palace, government ministries and the central bank.

A huge explosion was reported at 11.20am (0650 GMT), shortly after one of the bombers blew himself up near the palace.

Five of the insurgents were killed as Afghan security forces took control of a besieged shopping centre.

View Kabul attacks in a larger map

Television pictures showed the Qari Sami shopping centre in the centre of city on fire.

A second mall, the Gulbahar Centre, about half a mile away, was also shown spewing smoke.

A security source said an attacker had blown himself up outside it, killing several police and intelligence officials.

Helicopters whirled overhead as more than 200 Afghan security forces took on the militants in gun battles on deserted streets.

Blasts targeted key ministries and the presidential palace

A UN spokesman later confirmed to Sky News the firefights with the insurgents had ended.

Sky News’ Asia correspondent Alex Crawford said Afghan police believed there may have been as many as 30 insurgents involved in the attacks.

The Defence Ministry, the Justice Ministry and the luxury Serena Hotel, which is frequented by Westerners, were understood to be among the targets.

Around a dozen of the attackers are believed to have worn suicide vests.

Crawford said police were unsure if the attackers had made their way into the Serena Hotel.

“There appears to be a large amount of chaos in several areas across the capital,” she said at the peak of the violence.

After more than three hours of gunfights President Hamid Karzai said security had been restored to the capital, though search operations continued amid reports that attackers were hiding in the city.

Crawford said the attacks had come “just as the President was swearing-in part of his Cabinet, which was fairly controversial”.

“It has been turned down twice because it has not been seen to be engaging fresh members,” she said.

Afghanistan’s health ministry said at least 38 people, most of them civilians, have been wounded in the fighting.

A Taliban spokesman said Afghan troops had been killed, but the claim could not be immediately confirmed.