Suicide bomber kills six in Afghanistan

Published: 5:23AM Wednesday June 03, 2009 Source: Reuters

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Six Afghan civilians, including two women and two children, were killed in a suicide bomb attack near the main base for US-led troops in Afghanistan on Wednesday, the interior ministry said.

With violence surging in Afghanistan despite rising numbers of foreign troops, a police spokesman in western Farah province also said at least 10 Afghan guards working for a US security firm were killed by Taliban fighters on Tuesday.

The suicide attack which killed the six Afghans was near Bagram airfield, about 60 km north of the capital Kabul, said Interior Ministry spokesman Zemaray Bashary.

The civilians were travelling in a car on a road in the Sayad area about 5 km north of Bagram, Bashary said. There were no details about the intended target or if the bomber was on foot or had used a car.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility but roadside bombs and suicide attacks are common tactics used by the Taliban.

Two Americans, including a soldier, were killed in an attack on a US military convoy on a road leading to Bagram on May 20.

The Taliban have spread their attacks in recent months out of traditional strongholds in the south and the east into previously more secure areas in the west and north and even to the outskirts of Kabul.

The insurgency has grown even as the number of foreign troops has increased to almost 80,000 this year, with the period from late 2007 the worst since US-led and Afghan forces toppled the Taliban's Islamist government from power in late 2001.

One soldier from the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) was killed and two were wounded in an attack in eastern Afghanistan on Wednesday, ISAF said. No other details were available.

Four ISAF troops were killed in two separate roadside bomb attacks in the east on Monday.

In western Farah, provincial police spokesman Abdul Rahoof Ahmadi said the Afghan guards were ambushed by Taliban fighters in Bala Boluk district. The guards were providing security for supply trucks for foreign troops, he said.

Four of the guards' vehicles were also set ablaze.

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