Eighteen wounded in Afghanistan

A bomb wounded at least 18 people in the main market of the southern Afghan city of Kandahar yesterday and President Hamid Karzai called it a "terrorist" attempt to disrupt a key constitutional assembly.

Police blamed the Taliban or allied Islamic militants fighting the US-backed government for the blast which shattered windows in a hotel. A Reuters reporter saw 18 wounded people in hospital.

A spokesman for the hardline Islamic Taliban, which used to rule Afghanistan, denied responsibility, saying: "Taliban do no attack civilian targets."

Karzai said the blast was meant to disrupt elections for a Grand Assembly, or Loya Jirga, due to meet this month in Kabul to approve a new constitution to allow for a presidential election in June. "They want to frighten people and disrupt the election process," he said in a statement.

A police officer at the scene said the bomb may have been rigged to a bicycle, while local intelligence chief General Mohammad Salim said it had been hidden inside a pressure cooker.

Victims, all male Afghan shopkeepers or bystanders, were seen bleeding on the street in Kandahar's main market which was crowded with people at the time.

Afghan and US troops quickly cordoned off the area. Two of the worst wounded were transferred to the US hospital at Kandahar air base. A later controlled explosion by US troops caused some renewed panic in the city.

Taliban spokesman Mullah Abdul Samad denied responsibility but reiterated a warning from the Taliban leadership council on Friday that anyone attending the Loya Jirga deserved to be killed. "We do not differentiate between the people who will attend Loya Jirga and the Americans," he told Reuters by telephone. Last Wednesday, two US soldiers were wounded, one seriously, when a renegade Afghan policeman threw a grenade at a US military vehicle in the same part of Kandahar.

Kandahar was the seat of power of the Taliban regime overthrown by US-led forces in late 2001. It and the surrounding province have been the scene of a number of attacks blamed on the guerillas and their militant allies since then. Earlier, the US military said it seized a large arms cache on Thursday hidden at Kandahar's main jail, from where 41 Taliban members staged a dramatic tunnel escape in October.

Before the bomb Karzai said voting to choose the 500 Loya Jirga delegates had been going well, but suggested the meeting, due to start on Wednesday, might start more than a week late. Visiting Kabul on Thursday, US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld dismissed suggestions the Taliban could disrupt the June elections, despite a surge in bloody attacks.