13 Afghans killed by bicycle bomb Victims were waiting for seeds given out as part of anti-poppy campaign
Source: The star
KABUL—A bomb concealed on a bicycle killed 13 people Wednesday in southern Afghanistan, as the Pentagon’s top military officer said NATO forces hope to reverse the Taliban’s momentum in the south with an upcoming offensive in Kandahar.
Forty-five people, including eight children, were wounded in the blast, which occurred in the Nahr-e-Sarraj district just north of Lashkar Gah, the capital of Helmand province, said deputy provincial police chief Kamaluddin, who uses one name.
The bomb exploded near a crowd gathered to receive free vegetable seeds provided by the British government as part of a program to encourage them not to plant opium poppy, provincial government spokesman Daoud Ahmadi said.
Casualty figures fluctuated several times during the day because of communications problems in the area, Kamaluddin said.
No one claimed responsibility for the attack, which President Hamid Karzai blamed on “enemies of the Afghan people who are against peace.”
The acting provincial head of agriculture, Ghulam Sahki, said the blast could have been the work of drug dealers trying to stop the alternative crop program. NATO and the Afghan government hope poppy farmers in the south, where most of the world’s opium is grown, will adopt legal crops with the help of cash incentives and programs like the seed distribution. The narcotics trade helps fund the Taliban insurgency.
KABUL—A bomb concealed on a bicycle killed 13 people Wednesday in southern Afghanistan, as the Pentagon’s top military officer said NATO forces hope to reverse the Taliban’s momentum in the south with an upcoming offensive in Kandahar.
Forty-five people, including eight children, were wounded in the blast, which occurred in the Nahr-e-Sarraj district just north of Lashkar Gah, the capital of Helmand province, said deputy provincial police chief Kamaluddin, who uses one name.
The bomb exploded near a crowd gathered to receive free vegetable seeds provided by the British government as part of a program to encourage them not to plant opium poppy, provincial government spokesman Daoud Ahmadi said.
Casualty figures fluctuated several times during the day because of communications problems in the area, Kamaluddin said.
No one claimed responsibility for the attack, which President Hamid Karzai blamed on “enemies of the Afghan people who are against peace.”
The acting provincial head of agriculture, Ghulam Sahki, said the blast could have been the work of drug dealers trying to stop the alternative crop program. NATO and the Afghan government hope poppy farmers in the south, where most of the world’s opium is grown, will adopt legal crops with the help of cash incentives and programs like the seed distribution. The narcotics trade helps fund the Taliban insurgency.
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