At least 12 killed in car bomb blast

At least 12 people were killed and scores injured in one of the deadliest bomb blasts in the Afghan capital, Kabul, after the installation of Hamid Karzai's government late last year, security officials told IRIN on Thursday. The blast in the Pole-Baghe Omomi shopping center - an area opposite the Ministry of Culture and Information - occurred in a taxi, minutes after a smaller device on a bicycle exploded, drawing hundreds of people to it with curiosity. "It killed at least 12 people and injured many more," a UN source told IRIN in Kabul, explaining that the bicycle explosion was aimed at attracting a larger crowd for higher casualties. But Afghan authorities said the death toll could be as high as 30. "As long as al-Qaeda is around, we expect attacks to continue," an Afghan security official told IRIN. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the blast that follows a series of smaller bomb explosions in the capital. Reuters news agency quoted police spokesman Dul Aqa as saying the explosion was very powerful. "We can't say exactly who was behind it but we know the last bombs were al-Qaida and [former Prime Minister] Gulbuddin [Hekmatyar]," Aqa said. Hekmatyar issued a call for jihad, or holy war, this week to drive US and foreign troops including international peacekeepers from Afghanistan. International media said 34 people were taken to Jamhuriat Hospital. Given the lack of facilities to handle broken bones and other serious injuries there, they were subsequently transferred to the Italian Emergency Hospital and the Wazir Akbar Khan Hospital, doctors said. Police sealed off the area, but emergency vehicles could be seen rushing the injured to hospitals. Some dazed victims could be seen being led away, their clothing ripped and covered in blood. Five or six vehicles were destroyed, windows shattered and doors of shops ripped off their hinges by the blast, witnesses were quoted as saying.