Bomb kills 21 wedding guests

A roadside bomb struck a tractor carrying revellers to a wedding in southern Afghanistan, killing 21 civilians in a deadly strike as the country gears up for a presidential election.

The attack, which took place yesterday but was not reported until this morning, was part of rising violence in the final stages of campaigning for the August 20 election in which incumbent Hamid Karzai is favoured to win a new term.

General Sher Mohammad Zazai, commander of an Afghan military unit in Helmand province, said the explosion occurred in Garmsir, part of the province where US Marines launched the biggest operation of the war last month against Taliban militants.

"It's the work of the enemy of the nation, it's the work of the enemy of peace and the work of the Taliban," Zazai said.

Assadullah Sherzad, police chief of Helmand province, said by telephone that the dead included women and children heading to a wedding in a trailer hauled by a tractor. The defence and interior ministries confirmed the toll.

A spokesman for the US Marines in the area said he was checking the report.

Violence across Afghanistan has hit its worst levels since US-led Afghan forces toppled the Taliban in 2001.

Last month, US and British forces launched simultaneous major operations in Helmand province and are still fighting to secure areas previously held by Taliban insurgents.

The operations are meant to expand the government's control of the volatile south ahead of the election as part of US efforts to defeat militants in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

TALIBAN SEEKS POLL BOYCOTT

The Taliban have vowed to disrupt the poll and called on Afghans to boycott it. Attacks on presidential running mates and candidates' convoys were reported across the country last week.

Diplomats say security concerns could cut turnout, especially in southern and eastern provinces, adjacent to Pakistan and populated mainly by Pashtun, Afghanistan's largest ethnic group.

A map obtained by Reuters on Tuesday showed that almost half of Afghanistan was at a high risk of attack by the Taliban and other insurgents or is under "enemy control".

More than 1,000 civilians were killed between January and June - against 818 in the same period last year, according to UN data. At least 71 international troops were killed in July, the worst monthly toll for foreign forces since the war started.

In other incidents, the Interior Ministry said a roadside bomb exploded by a police vehicle today in Ned Ali district, also in Helmand province, killing five officers and injuring three.

In neighbouring Kandahar province, NATO-led forces fired on a vehicle from a helicopter late yesterday, but disputed accounts by Afghan officials that civilians died in the strike.

Jirai district governor Niaz Mohammad Sarhadi said five people were killed in a vehicle carrying cucumbers. But US military spokesman Lieutenant Commander Christine Sidenstricker said the vehicle was being loaded with weapons.

"Our information is that insurgents have been killed."

The US military also reported the death of a service member in the western province of Farah while on patrol yesterday.