AFGHANISTAN – At least one police officer was killed and 15 people wounded after an explosion rocked a crowded road in Lashkar Gah, capital of Afghanistan’s southern province of Helmand on Sunday, a provincial government spokesman confirmed.
“The blast occurred in Police District 1 of the city roughly at 10:15 a.m. local time. The initial information stated that the blast was caused by an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) attached to a motorcycle parked at the area,” spokesman Omar Zwak told Xinhua.
Among the wounded people, who were shifted to a war victim’s emergency hospital in the city, were one woman and two children, the official said. The blast reportedly targeted a police van driving along the road in the area where several shops and vehicles were also damaged.
No group has claimed responsibility for the attack so far. Helmand province, notorious for poppy growing, is a known Taliban stronghold.
More than 31,000 civilians have died and about 62,000 have been injured as a result of armed conflict in Afghanistan since January 2009, according to figures of the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC). Enditem-(Xinhua)
