The officials reported that 5 British soldiers were shot dead at a checkpoint in Nad Ali district of Helmand province, Afghanistan. The attack has been allegedly carried out by Afghan policeman. The UK defense ministry said that they are investigating as to what really happened at the scene.

A spokesperson from the department said “An Afghan national policeman from the checkpoint started firing without warning before anyone could really respond, every effort is being put into hunting him down”. Reuters news agency reported that the British military spokesman said in Kabul that the gunmen may have been working with other men during the attack.

Britain’s prime minister, Gordon Brown said that it was a “terrible loss”. He said “They fought to make Afghanistan more secure, but above all to make Britain safer from the terrorism and extremism which continues to threaten us from the border areas of Afghanistan and Pakistan”.

Then Brown continued and addressed the UK parliament “It appears that they were targeted because they were engaged in what our enemies fear most – they were mentoring and training Afghan forces”.

“The Taliban have claimed responsibility for this incident, so it may be that the Taliban have used an Afghan police member or that they have infiltrated the Afghan police”.

A research person at the UK defense Academy, Dr Aminullah Habibi told Al-Jazeera that it was not surprising that the Taliban had appeared to have infiltrated the Afghan police. He said “Afghanistan is a post-conflict country, infiltration in the police is not something difficult, it can happen”.

“I think that the strategy to train the Afghan forces is right, and I think that’s the only strategy, and it’s good that the international community is taking that seriously”.

“But I think that the tactics might be a bit different, simply because mentoring and staying with the officers could be dangerous because they have access all the time, staying with them, having food with them, staying in the same place day and night, that might make it easy”.

229 British troops have been killed since 2001 Afghanistan invasion.