Up to 100 Afghan Taliban guerillas attacked a police station in the volatile southern province of Zabul early yesterday, killing eight policemen and wounding two others, a local official said. The latest attack by a resurgent guerilla movement occurred in Zabul's Arghandab district shortly before 2am, district officer Haji Qudratullah said. He said up to 100 Taliban fighters were involved, who burned down the district office and destroyed four vehicles. Qudratullah said he had no figure for Taliban casualties, though he had heard that some of the attackers had been killed. "People said they took dead bodies with them," he said. Government forces had reoccupied the area after dawn. The attack was just the latest in a series by the Taliban movement. The period since the start of August has been the bloodiest in Afghanistan since the fall of the Taliban, with more than 300 people killed, many of them in guerilla attacks. The dead have included Afghan aid workers, government soldiers, policemen and US troops from the 11,500-strong US-led force still searching for Taliban remnants and Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. Meanwhile, Afghan authorities said they had so far failed to recapture any of the 41 Taliban prisoners who made an audacious tunnel escape from the main prison in the southern city of Kandahar. Among the escapees was Moulavi Abdullah, brother of former Taliban defence minister Obaidullah, and a commander named Aziz Agham who officials say mounted a number of guerilla attacks in the months before his capture earlier this year. Afghan and US forces pursuing Islamic militants accuse neighbouring Pakistan, the main backer of the Taliban until the September 11 attacks, of providing sanctuary for the guerillas and allowing them to slip across the border to mount attacks. But Pakistan says recent operations it has launched against militants in its tribal borderlands are proof of its commitment to the "war on terror". Government officials said the Friday night escape could not have been carried out without the assistance of guards. And a Taliban commander, Mullah Sabir, said yesterday the group paid bribes of 100,000 afghanis (2,000 US dollars) to the prison authorities for each of the escapees. **PHOTO CAPTION*** Pakistan has arrested 32 tribesmen for refusing to hand over three people who allegedly harboured Taliban and al-Qaeda fighters near the Afghan border. (AFP/File/Tariq Mahmood)