Blast hits US military convoy in Afghanistan

ASADABAD, Afghanistan (Reuters) – A blast hit a U.S.
military convoy in Afghanistan on Saturday but there were no
immediate reports of casualties, Afghan provincial officials
said.

Violence in Afghanistan has intensified in recent days
since Taliban insurgents said they launched a spring offensive
in their campaign to oust foreign troops and defeat the
Western-backed government.

The explosion happened in the Peche valley of eastern Kunar
province, near the border with Pakistan and the scene of
repeated clashes between insurgents and U.S. and Afghan
government troops.

A helicopter was seen landing in the area soon after the
blast, leading to speculation it may have been evacuating
casualties, said one official, who declined to be identified.

A U.S. military spokesman said he had no report on the
blast, which was in the same area where four U.S. soldiers were
killed by a roadside bomb last month.

In a separate incident, a suicide car-bomber blew himself
up near a convoy of Canadian and Afghan government troops in
the southern province of Kandahar, but none of the troops was
hurt, said Afghan commander General Rahmatullah Raufi.

It was the third suicide blast in Kandahar in three days.

Just after the blast, panicked Afghan troops shot dead a
man riding a motorbike in the mistaken suspicion he was another
attacker, Raufi said.

In a separate incident, the head of an elected provincial
council in the northeastern province of Takhar was killed by
unidentified gunmen who raided his house on Saturday, an
interior ministry official said.

Sayed Sadiq, a former factional commander, was elected to
the province’s council in legislative elections in September.

Militants are not known to be active in the province and
some residents speculated he might have been killed as a result
of a factional feud.

The interior ministry said it was investigating.