South Asia News

Suicide bomb attack kills 13 people in northern Afghanistan

Apr 4, 2012, 13:49 GMT

Kabul - A suicide bomber on a motorbike blew himself up in a market in northern Afghanistan on Wednesday, killing 13 people including four police officers and three soldiers with international forces, officials said.

The suicide bomb attack took place at a vegetable bazaar in Maimana, the capital of Faryab province.

Among those killed were also members of the international forces.

Afghan Interior Ministry spokesman Sediq Sediqqi said that there were scores injured in a notorcycle bombing in the north.

The NATO-led alliance in a press statement said three soldiers were killed in an explosion in northern Afghanistan but refrained from saying whether it was the same suicide bomb attack in Maimana.

It also did not disclose the nationality of the soldiers.

Lal Mohammad Ahamadzia, the police spokesman for the northern Afghanistan police command, said that the Afghan victims included four police, two children, two women and two men were killed in the bombing.

Abdul Haq Shafaq, the provincial governor of Faryab where the incident took place said that a number of US soldiers along with the Afghan national police were talking to the locals in the city when the attack took place.

'Until now, we have a total casualty figure of 32 people in the incident that includes both death and injured,' he said, adding three American soldiers and one of their interpreters were also wounded.

He did not confirm the death of the coalition soldiers.

He said the coalition and the Afghan police were 'roaming in the city for the past three days and the local authorities had warned them to avoid walking in the city among the civilians.' Abdul Haq Shafaq, Faryab's governor, put the death toll at six civilians and 20 others wounded. 'Three foreign troops and one of their Afghan interpreters were also wounded,' he said.

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