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NATO convoy hit in blast

KABUL: A suicide car bomber attacked a NATO convoy in Kabul on Tuesday killing 18 people, including five U.S. soldiers, a Canadian soldier and 12 civilians in the deadliest strike on the capital in over a year.

The Taliban, which is leading a nearly nine-year insurgency against the Afghan government and its foreign backers, claimed responsibility for the bomb, having pledged a new nationwide campaign of attacks.

The attacker detonated the bomb during rush hour, unleashing blood and chaos on a clogged street near Parliament and on a nearby hospital run by foreigners, an army recruitment centre and the ministry of water and energy.

Interior ministry spokesman Zemarai Bashary said 12 civilians were killed and 47 wounded. Most had been passing in a bus when the bomber blew up the car. Children and women were among the dead. The American University of Afghanistan was across the road from the bomb site. — AFP

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