One soldier dead, 6 wounded in Afghan suicide blast

JALALABAD, Afghanistan (Reuters) – A suicide car bomber killed one foreign soldier and wounded six other people, including three civilians, in the eastern Afghan province of Nangarhar on Saturday, the provincial governor said. The Taliban have vowed to step up their campaign of suicide bombings this year, after carrying out 140 such attacks in 2007 which killed 200 civilians.

The suicide car bomber rammed his car into a moving military convoy in the city of Jalalabad before detonating explosives, Gol Agha Shirzai, governor of Nangarhar province, said.

One coalition soldier was killed and three wounded, he said.

Three civilians were also wounded in the attack.

The nationalities of the dead and wounded soldiers is not known but most of the soldiers stationed in Nangarhar are American.

The al Qaeda-backed Taliban largely rely on suicide attacks and roadside bomb blasts as part of their insurgency against the pro-Western Afghan government and the more than 60,000 foreign troops in the country.