31 Aug 2013

Suicide bomber kills 8 in Afghan mosque

6:19 am on 31 August 2013

A suicide bomber has blown himself up at a mosque in northern Afghanistan, killing the district governor, a policeman and at least six other worshippers.

The blast erupted in the middle of a crowd gathered outside the mosque building after a funeral prayer session on Friday for a tribal elder.

The bomber targeted Sheikh Sadruddin, the district governor of Archi, in the yard of a mosque while he was attending a prayer ceremony.

District police chief Hamid Agha says six civilians and one policeman were killed and 25 other people were wounded, some of them critically.

Northern Afghanistan is relatively peaceful compared with the south and east but Kunduz province has often been the scene of explosions, targeted killings and other insurgent unrest in recent years, AFP reports.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack, which occurred in a district close to the border with Tajikistan.

Taliban militants have launched a spate of attacks in recent days, with more than 30 people killed on Wednesday in separate strikes, including 15 policemen shot in an ambush in the western province of Farah.