IE 11 is not supported. For an optimal experience visit our site on another browser.

Bombs kill 6 in Afghanistan

A roadside bomb struck an Afghan army vehicle in an eastern province Monday, killing four soldiers and wounding two, an official said. Several hours later a suicide bomber killed two civilians in Kabul.
Afghanistan Violence
An Afghan man stands near the wreckage of a vehicle after it was hit by a bomb blast in the Musayi district, south of Kabul, on Monday.Musadeq Sadeq / AP
/ Source: The Associated Press

A roadside bomb struck an Afghan army vehicle in an eastern province Monday, killing four soldiers and wounding two, an official said. Several hours later a suicide bomber killed two civilians in Kabul.

The attacker blew himself up next to a convoy of armored vehicles used by foreigners in the central part of the capital, killing the civilians and himself, according to Gen. Ali Shah Paktiawal, director of criminal investigations for the Kabul police. The target of the attack wasn't immediately known.

U.S. and Afghan security forces raced to the scene, as broken glass and pieces of the vehicle littered the street in a neighborhood of the capital where many foreigners live. The body of one victim lay in the street.

The speaker of the lower house of parliament led a mass walkout of lawmakers, protesting government actions following the killing of six lawmakers and 61 schoolchildren earlier this month, one of the country's worst atrocities since the fall of the Taliban.

The soldiers were attacked with a remote-controlled bomb in Paktia province as they traveled toward their base, said Din Mohammad Darwish, spokesman for the provincial governor.

Two of the wounded soldiers were in critical condition, he said.

Also Monday, a blast ripped through a car south of the capital of Kabul, killing four civilians, police said. The explosion occurred in the Musayi district of Kabul province, where a bomb had been freshly planted in the muddy, unpaved road, regional police commander Gen. Zalmai Oryakhail said.

More than 6,000 people -- a record number -- have died this year in insurgency-related violence in Afghanistan, according to figures from Afghan and Western officials. Most of those killed are militants.

Dozens of lawmakers walked out of parliament Monday, led by lower house speaker Mohammad Yunus Qanuni who is also a top opposition figure.

Qanuni is a leading figure in the National Front, the largest opposition group challenging U.S.-backed President Hamid Karzai's authority and the walkout is likely to deepen Afghanistan's political divide.

Qanuni said the government had ignored parliament's demand for the suspension of officials in the northern province of Baghlan where a suicide bomber attacked a visiting delegation of lawmakers on Nov. 6.

Some 77 people, including 61 students and six lawmakers were killed, and more than 100 were wounded in the blast and the subsequent shooting by panicked guards, officials said. One of the lawmakers killed was a key opposition member.

Shortly after the incident, parliament demanded the suspension of Baghlan's governor and six other provincial officials pending results of a government investigation.

"I do not want to stay here and sit in this position until your demands are fulfilled," Qanuni said shortly before leaving the chamber.

Only government can appoint or remove provincial governors.

Dozens of lawmakers followed Qanuni out of the chamber but it was not immediately clear how many were present in the session, or how many left.

There was no immediate comment from Karzai's government, which has not yet announced the results of its own investigation.

An internal U.N. report obtained by The Associated Press last week suggested that lawmakers' bodyguards fired wildly into a crowd after the suicide bombing, killing mostly schoolchildren.

The report also suggests some people within the U.N. mission in Afghanistan want legal action taken against the gunmen, who were guarding a group of about a dozen lawmakers from parliament's economic committee being greeted by hundreds of children on a visit to a factory in the normally peaceful north.

But the U.N's mission in Afghanistan concedes that the report is one of several conflicting views inside the world body and has not been officially endorsed.