Date:07/11/2007 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2007/11/07/stories/2007110757151500.htm

International

Black smoke... lots of people lying dead

Kabul: A bomb attack targeted a group of lawmakers in northern Afghanistan on Tuesday, killing at least 28 people, including five parliamentarians, officials said.

Death tolls varied widely in the confusion of the attack, which also wounded dozens of school children. While, a high-ranking government official said 64 people had died, another agency report put the death toll to 100 including six lawmakers.

The bomb blast went off outside a sugar factory in the northern province of Baghlan as the lawmakers were about to go inside. The blast struck school children, Afghan elders and government officials who had gathered to greet the visiting delegation of 18 lawmakers from the lower house, officials said.

The Ministry of Interior said at least 28 people were killed in the blast, but a doctor at Baghlan's main hospital, Dr. Mohammad Yousuf Fayez, said dozens of dead bodies may also have been left at the blast site and collected by families, meaning they wouldn't have been counted officially.

At least 42 school children were among 81 people wounded, Fayez said.

``The children were standing on both sides of the street, and were shaking the hands of the officials, then suddenly the explosion happened,'' Fayez said.

President Hamid Karzai's office confirmed the deaths of at least five parliamentarians.

``This heinous act of terrorism is against Islam and humanity and I condemn it in the strongest possible terms,'' Karzai said in a statement. ``It is the work of the enemies of peace and security in Afghanistan.''

The attack is among the deadliest in Afghanistan since the 2001 U.S.-led invasion. Taliban bombers have killed regional governors in the past, but never have militants killed so many high-ranking officials in one attack.

A U.S. military spokesman said the blast was the same as those often carried out by the Taliban. Lt. Col. David Accetta , who condemned ``this kind of terrorist and criminal attack,'' said he had no information indicating al-Qaida was behind the blast.

Interior Ministry spokesman Zemeri Bashary confirmed the deaths of 28 people. He said the lawmakers were part of parliament's economic commission.

He blamed the attack on the ``enemy of Afghanistan, the enemy of the people of Afghanistan,'' a term commonly used here to refer to Taliban militants but that could also include other terrorist groups like al-Qaida.

This year has been the deadliest in Afghanistan since the fall of the Taliban. More than 5,700 people have been killed in insurgency-related violence, according to an Associated Press count based on figures from Western and Afghan officials.-AP