Suicide bomber kills nine in Afghanistan

A suicide bomber dressed in a military uniform has rammed his motorcycle into a fleet of buses carrying Afghan army officers in Kabul, in the bloodiest attack in the Afghan capital since the 2001 war.

The blast came outside the main Afghan army training centre, and most of the nine dead and 28 wounded were believed to be Afghan soldiers.

Initial indications were that the bombing was modelled on similar attacks in Iraq, where insurgents have repeatedly targeted recruiting centres for Iraqi soldiers and police working alongside US forces.

Yesterday's bomber rode up to the entrance of the training centre and rammed a convoy of minibuses carrying soldiers.

"I saw the bodies of badly mutilated soldiers and the buses were on fire," said Khail Mohammed, an Afghan soldier who witnessed the attack.

Blackened and burned out minibuses lay strewn across the road after the attack.

It happened on the Jalalabad Road, the main route east out of Kabul. The road is the site of a major UN compound and several military bases, and has become notorious for hidden explosives.

The bomber's head was blown off in the blast, according to officials.

Afghan security sources said they believed the bomber may have been an Arab, and had information that an al Qaeda suicide squad was in Afghanistan.

But in an apparent effort to counter those claims, a spokesman for the Taleban, Abdul Latif Hakimi, named the bomber as Sardar Mohammed, a resident of Kabul.

"More mujahideen suiciders are ready to follow his way and you will witness them doing it in the future," he said.

The attack comes amid by far the bloodiest year in Afghanistan since the 2001 war, with the Taleban resurgent and an insurgency growing steadily more serious across much of the south and east.

But Kabul, along with the peaceful north and west, has been largely immune from the violence until now.

The attack will fuel fears that the Taleban are copying tactics from Iraq. Security sources say that foreign militants have been crossing into Afghanistan -- but as trainers and advisors for local insurgents, not as foot soldiers.

In a separate development, Afghan police yesterday arrested a suspected gangster accused of being behind the kidnapping of an Italian aid worker earlier this year.

Timur Shah is alleged to be the leader of a crime gang that abducted Clementina Cantoni. The motive was believed to be financial.

- INDEPENDENT