Suicide bombing targeting minister kills 4 in W Afghanistan

    KABUL, Sept. 27, 2009, (Xinhua) --

A suicide bombing targeting the vehicle of Afghan Minister of Energy and Water Ismael Khan Sunday morning in Herat City, capital of Herat province in western Afghanistan, killed at least four civilians and wounded 17 others, but the official escaped unhurt, sources said.

    Abdul Rauf Ahmadi, the spokesman for police forces in west Afghanistan, told Xinhua that a suicide bomber driving explosive-laden car blew himself up when the minister's vehicle passed by the road.

    Witnesses said the explosion occurred near a school.

    "At least four civilians around were killed and 17 more, some of them students, were wounded," Ahmadi added.

    He said the minister, who escaped unhurt, was on his way to the airport when the blast took place.

    Editor: Fang Yang

6 foreign troops killed in Afghanistan

By Rahim Faiez, Associated Press Writer –

September 27, 2009

KABUL –

A suicide car bomb explosion targeting Afghanistan's energy minister killed four civilians Sunday, while attacks and a violent storm killed six international troops, including three French and two American forces, officials said.

Taliban assassination attempts against Afghan officials have intensified this year, with more than 100 officials and pro-government tribal elders attacked — half of them fatally.

The convoy carrying Energy Minister Ismail Khan, a powerbroker in the western region of Herat, was headed to the airport when a suicide car bomb exploded outside a high school, said Raouf Ahmadi, a police spokesman. Ahmadi said four civilians died and 17 people were wounded, including four of Khan's bodyguards.

He said Khan escaped unharmed and arrived safely at the airport.

A Taliban spokesman, Zabiullah Mujahid, claimed responsibility and said the explosion targeted Khan, who was once governor of Herat, a western province bordering Iran.

The Taliban assassination campaign is a strong sign of deteriorating security in the country, where a record number of U.S. and NATO troops have also died this year. The Obama administration is now debating whether to send more American troops to Afghanistan as its government faces allegations of widespread fraud from the disputed Aug. 20 presidential election.

An airstrike Saturday by international forces in Wardak province, bordering Kabul, killed three Afghan civilians, said Shahidullah Shahid, spokesman for the provincial governor. Civilian deaths in airstrikes have infuriated Afghans, and the top NATO commander, U.S. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, has made protecting innocent Afghans a top priority.

Two U.S. service members died Saturday in the country's south — one from a roadside bomb explosion and the other from an insurgent attack, the NATO-led force said. A British soldier died Sunday from a bomb explosion while patrolling in southern Afghanistan, Britain's Defense Ministry said.

Elsewhere, three French soldiers died in a violent storm in northeastern Afghanistan late Saturday. One soldier was struck by lightning while two were swept away by a rain-swollen river during an operation in Kapisa province, said military spokesman Christophe Prazuck.

This year has been the deadliest of the eight-year war for U.S. and NATO troops. The latest six deaths bring to 64 the number of NATO troops killed this month.

Elsewhere in western Afghanistan, three Afghan civilians died when their vehicle hit a roadside bomb in Farah province. Gen. Mohammad Faqir Askir, Farah's police chief, said the vehicle had just turned off the main highway toward a village when the bomb exploded.

Afghanistan's Interior Ministry said seven Taliban fighters were killed in a gunbattle Saturday with police in Kunduz province, once a relatively peaceful region in the north of the country that has recently seen more violence as Taliban fighters try to expand control.

Six NATO soldiers killed in Afghanistan

September 27, 2009

KABUL (AFP) –

Six NATO soldiers including three French service personnel have died over the last 24 hours in Afghanistan, NATO and the French authorities announced on Sunday.

"In several separate incidents, three International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) service members died as a result of enemy activity in southern Afghanistan and three ISAF service members died from a non-combat related incident in eastern Afghanistan in the last 24 hours," ISAF said in a statement.

In the first incident on Saturday, an American soldier died of wounds sustained when an improvised-explosive device (IED) detonated in southern Afghanistan, the force said.

A second US trooper died Saturday, also in the south, as a result of wounds suffered during an insurgent attack, the statement said.

An ISAF soldier whose nationality was not released died Sunday when an IED went off in southern Afghanistan.

The statement said further details would be withheld until next of kin had been notified.

The south is the most violent part of Afghanistan and foreign forces have suffered heavy losses recently in the provinces of Helmand and Kandahar, bastions of the Taliban insurgency.

The three French soldiers were killed in a lightning storm during an operation targeting Taliban bomb squads in the east, the French military said on Sunday.

One was killed by lightning and two others drowned, said Admiral Christophe Prazuck, spokesman for the French armed forces general staff.

They were part of a 250-troop operation hunting fighters responsible for planting roadside bombs in the Afghanya Valley east of Kabul, the spokesman said.

France has now lost 34 soldiers in Afghanistan, where it has 2,900 troops in the NATO-led coalition battling Taliban guerrillas and training Afghanistan's national security forces.

This year has been the deadliest for foreign troops in Afghanistan since US forces ousted the Taliban from Kabul following the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States.

Some 376 foreign soldiers, including 220 Americans, have died so far, with 294 killed in all of 2008, according to an AFP count relying on the independent www.icasualties.org website.