One killed as Jalalabad hit by two bomb blasts

At least one man was killed and 26 other people, including five children and three police officers, were injured in bomb explosions in the eastern city of Jalalabad on Wednesday, according to officials from the Afghan Interior Ministry. The bombs went off shortly after 1 pm in the city, the capital of the eastern Nangarhar province. "The two bomb explosions happened on Wednesday afternoon in Jalalabad city, both at security posts, one at the police post on the main road and another at a post close to a crowded bus station," Lutfullah Mashal, an Interior Ministry spokesperson, told IRIN in the capital Kabul on Thursday. "The explosions caused the death of one man and the injuring of 26 others, six of them critically," Mohammad Younus Noorzai, the security commander of Nangarhar province, told IRIN. He said those critically wounded were evacuated to Bagram hospital by Coalition forces. Noorzai added that no one had yet been detained in connection with the two blasts, but that security forces were working hard to find the suspects. They were asking local people, tribal leaders and elders for help in making arrests. This was the second such incident in Jalalabad in the course of the past week. The previous one, last Saturday, killed two women and wounded 12 other people. In a separate development, Interior Ministry spokesperson Mashal said that 1,500 trainee police officers had graduated recently, and that they would be sent to the provinces and rural areas to boost security with ISAF (International Security Assistance Force) and Coalition forces so that the coming elections could be held in a free and secure atmosphere.