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U.K. Soldier Said Killed in Afghan Blast

Posted on: Wednesday, 28 January 2004, 06:00 CST

An explosion Wednesday near the British base in the Afghan capital killed a British soldier and injured several others, the deputy commander of the peacekeeping force said, while police said a suicide attack near a German base just outside the city injured five foreigners.

The nearly simultaneous attacks came during a memorial ceremony for a Canadian soldier killed in a suicide attack in Kabul just the day before. An Afghan civilian was also killed.

One British soldier was killed near their base, said Canadian Maj. Gen. Andrew Leslie, deputy commander of the security force, speaking at the end of the memorial service at the Canadian base.

"Initial reports indicate that one of our British comrades lost his life and there have been several injuries," he said.

However, the British Defense Ministry in London said there had been no deaths in the attack, but some troops were injured.

Just east of Kabul near the German peacekeepers' base, a suicide bomber in a taxi detonated an explosion that injured five foreigners, said Qasim Mangal, a local police chief.

International troops and Afghan authorities closed off the scene of the attack, on the Jalalabad Road, about 1 1/4 miles from the Germans' base. From nearby, two burned out jeeps could be seen.

In Tuesday's attack, three more Canadian troops and eight civilians, including a Frenchman, were wounded when the bomber struck a convoy of three open-topped jeeps. At Wednesday's memorial, at least one of the new blasts was heard during the ceremony that took place in a snowstorm.

The Taliban had claimed responsibility for the Tuesday attack and alleged it would be the start of a campaign of suicide bombings across the country.

The escalating violence comes the same week that President Hamid Karzai signed the country's post-Taliban constitution into law, with hopes that it can help bring the fractured country together after more than two decades of war.

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