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Suicide blast near US Kabul base
26/06/2006 10:43 - (SA)
Kabul - A suicide car bomber blew himself up near a convoy at the biggest US base in Afghanistan on Monday, as the number of coalition soldiers killed in combat in the past week in the country rose to seven.
The Taliban claimed responsibility for the suicide blast which wounded two children near the Bagram air base north of Kabul, saying the attacker was acting in revenge for the killing of two of his brothers in a traffic accident involving a US military vehicle.
The latest violence comes amid some of the worst insurgency-linked bloodshed in Afghanistan since the Taliban regime was ousted in late 2001 by a coalition led by the United States.
Police said a station-wagon laden with explosives had veered towards a coalition convoy a kilometre outside the Bagram base and exploded.
Revenge
The suicide bomber was killed and his vehicle blown to pieces, said Yousuf Stanizai, spokesperson for the interior ministry that handles police matters.
"Two children were wounded," he said.
A purported Taliban spokesman, Mohammad Hanif, said the blast was carried out by an Afghan man who had "sworn to take his revenge from Americans since his two brothers were killed in the American accident".
Violence
He was referring to a May 29 crash in which a US military truck from Bagram lost control after a brake failure and ploughed into a dozen civilians cars at the northern entrance of the city. Around five Afghans were killed.
The crash set off a day of rioting that was the worst violence the capital had seen since the Taliban were toppled from government in late 2001. At the end of the day, about 20 people were dead.
Fighting across Afghanistan
Meanwhile the latest coalition fatality came during combat operations in eastern Afghanistan, the coalition said on Monday. The soldier, whose nationality was not released, died from wounds sustained in the battle in Kunar province bordering Pakistan on Sunday.
The coalition announced at the weekend that two more of its soldiers had died from wounds received in a battle in southern Kandahar province in which around 45 Taliban fighters were killed.
And on June 21 four US soldiers were killed in clashes with militants in Nuristan province.
Forty-four coalition soldiers have now died in combat in Afghanistan this year, around half of them Americans.
Almost 200 rebels have been also been killed in the past two weeks as part of Operation Mountain Thrust in the troubled south, the biggest coalition and Afghan army anti-Taliban drive yet, according to Afghan figures.
- AFP
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