Suicide Blasts Across Afghanistan

A suicide bomber killed a former militia commander and two others in Afghanistan's main southern city on Monday. Hours later, police thwarted a second attempted suicide attack in the same city when the bomber blew himself up as he fled from the officers.

Monday's attacks brought the number of suicide bombings in Afghanistan in the past two weeks to five — four of them in the former Taliban stronghold of Kandahar.

The U.S. military said Monday a U.S. soldier had been killed in a firefight on Sunday with militants in eastern Afghanistan. One U.S. soldier was wounded in the same clash.

The first suicide bomber struck Monday outside the Kandahar home of Agha Shah, a former militia commander who was allied with the U.S.-backed Northern Alliance, which swept the Taliban from power in late 2001, Kandahar Gov. Asadullah Khalid said.

The blast killed Shah, a supporter of President Hamid Karzai, as well as two civilian passers-by and wounded eight people, the governor said.

Khalid said pieces of the bomber's body were strewn around the area, but his head had been recovered. He said he appeared to be an Arab and was believed to be a Taliban member.

The second bombing came two hours later. Police received an intelligence report that an attacker was approaching a U.S. military base in the city. Afghan officers rushed to the area, prompting the assailant to run away before he detonated the explosives strapped to his body, Khalid said.

No one besides the bomber was hurt in the blast about a half mile from the U.S. base.

The bombings came a day after another suicide attack in Kandahar injured four British government officials. The deadliest suicide attack in the past two weeks was outside an army training center in the capital, Kabul, which killed nine people.

Suicide assaults have been far less frequent in Afghanistan than in Iraq, although senior Afghan officials have spoken in recent months of al Qaeda operatives entering the country to stage attacks.

Meanwhile, a remote-controlled bomb exploded in a small village in western Afghanistan, wounding 13 Afghans. The blast was believed to be an attempt to kill a winning candidate in last month's legislative elections, said local police chief Sufullah, who uses only one name.

The violence comes amid a reinvigorated insurgency by Taliban-led rebels that has killed more than 1,300 people in the past half year.

The U.S. military released a statement about Sunday's clash saying insurgents fought American and Afghan troops who were conducting an offensive operation in eastern Paktika province.

The wounded soldier was evacuated to a nearby base and was in stable condition, it said.

"This is a sad and tragic moment for us all," said Brig. Gen. Jack Sterling, a deputy commander of the U.S.-led coalition. "The soldiers serving here in Afghanistan are fighting on the very edge of freedom's blade, and the loss of anyone is a deep and painful event."

The death brought to 201 the number of U.S. troops killed in and around Afghanistan since U.S.-led forces invaded in late 2001 to oust the Taliban for harboring al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.

Meanwhile, a U.S. special forces Chinook helicopter caught fire and was destroyed after an engine malfunctioned and it made a hard landing during an operation in eastern Kunar province last Thursday, officials said. All onboard escaped unhurt.

The accident occurred in the same region where a similar MH-47 chopper was shot down in June, killing all 16 special forces troops on board, military spokeswoman Lt. Col. Catherine Reardon said.

The latest crash was the fourth this year involving Chinooks, large troop-carrying choppers that have proved essential in battling the insurgency in remote, largely inaccessible parts of Afghanistan.