Seven foreigners among 17 killed in Kabul blast

Kabul—A suicide car bombing in Kabul on Friday killed 17 people including seven foreigners, rescuers and police said. The killed included two US soldiers.

The blast ripped through one of Kabul’s busiest, most protected streets just outside the U.S. embassy.

The explosion occurred at a big intersection less than 100 meters (yards) from the heavily fortified embassy. Several US soldiers were at the site immediately after the blast, witnesses said.

Meanwhile, four Italian soldiers were wounded on Friday in a bomb blast while on patrol in Afghanistan, the Italian news agency reported.

The soldiers were in the western Afghan city of Farah when their military vehicle was hit by an explosive device detonated by the side of the road, the report said.

Of the four injured, one was described as being in a serious condition.

In Kandahar region the troops killed 21 militants in the latest battles in a major offensive launched a week ago in southern Afghanistan, the NATO-led force said here.

Taliban said on Friday they had carried out bombing in the Afghan capital Kabul that killed at least 16 people, up to 7 of them foreigners. They gave no further details.

President Hamid Karzai condemned the attack, saying, “Today’s heinous act of terrorism is against the values of Islam and humanity.”

An Associated Press reporter at the scene saw the bodies of two coalition soldiers lying yards from the Humvee. U.S. troops stood guard around the bodies, one of which was slumped in the gutter, the other covered by a plastic sheet.

NATO forces launched airstrikes and artillery and mortar barrages on Taliban positions in Kandahar’s Panjwayi district overnight, inflicting an unspecified number of Taliban casualties, said Maj. Scott Lundy, a NATO spokesman. No NATO or Afghan forces were hurt.—Agencies