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Suicide bomber wounds four Britons in Afghanistan

KANDAHAR: A suicide bomber rammed a car laden with explosives into a vehicle carrying British Government officials in southern Afghanistan on Sunday, wounding four of them, a U.S.-led coalition commander said.

The four were travelling in Kandahar city in an armoured Land cruiser when the suicide bomber in a Toyota Corolla attacked, said Col. Steve Bowes, a Canadian commander with the coalition.

Two of the Britons were in serious condition, while the other two were lightly wounded, Kandahar Governor Asadullah Khalid said.

He said the four were customs officials from London touring the region — a former stronghold of the Taliban — ahead of the launch of a British Government-sponsored project.

The suicide attacker died in the assault, the Governor said.

The Britons' vehicle was burned in the attack. Canadian troops based in the city cordoned off the area and rushed the four to hospital, Col. Bowes said.

The bombing was the third suicide attack in Afghanistan in two weeks. The deadliest was late last month when an attacker killed nine people as well as himself in a bombing outside an army training centre in Kabul.

It was not immediately clear who was behind the assaults.

The spate of attacks comes amid a major upsurge in violence across much of the country that has left more than 1,300 persons dead since March.

On Saturday, the U.S. military announced its 200th service member to die in and around Afghanistan since the Taliban was ousted four years ago. This year has been the deadliest yet for the 19,000 American troops based here, with 84 soldiers killed.

Still, the burden of the fighting now shouldered by U.S. forces may soon decrease. An 11,000-soldier NATO-led peacekeeping force, already responsible for security in Afghanistan's north and west, is gearing up to expand next year into the volatile south and east.

The move will allow the separate coalition force to reduce its size and focus on hunting down Osama bin Laden and his allies, thought to be hiding in rugged mountains in the region. — AP

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