KABUL — An attack on a caravan of American and European medical personnel in a remote area of northern Afghanistan has killed 10 people, The Washington Post reports.

Afghan officials said the group of doctors, traveling through northern provinces to provide medical care, were found shot to death and robbed of their belongings on Friday in Badakshan, a relatively peaceful mountain province which has nevertheless suffered from deteriorating security and a growing Taliban insurgency in recent years.

The group, which included foreigners and Afghans, appeared to be the same one that was working with the International Assistance Mission, an organization that has operated in Afghanistan since 1966. The organization confirmed in a statement that "it is likely" the dead are members of their eye camp team, which had been in Nurestan province at the invitation of the communities there.

The director of the International Assistance Mission, Dirk Frans, told the Associated Press that six Americans, one German, one Briton and two Afghans were part of the team. Among the dead was team leader Tom Little, an optometrist from New York who had been thrown out of Afghanistan by the Taliban government in 2001 amid a crackdown on Christian aid workers, Frans told the AP. Frans said the International Assistance Mission is registered as a nonprofit Christian organization but does not proselytize.

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