A suicide bomber blew himself up in front of the Interior Ministry in Kabul today, killing 12 people and wounding 42, the Afghan government said.
Afghanistan is experiencing the most serious violence since the hardline Taliban were ousted in 2001. While most of the violence has been in the south and east, attacks in Kabul have been increasing.
The bomber struck as Interior Ministry staff were arriving for work, getting off buses by an entrance, police said. Today is a work day in Afghanistan. Police had tried to stop the man, a witness said.
"It was a tall, fat guy. Police tried to stop him but he got away from them and ran towards the entrance and blew himself up among the people," said a witness, a young man named Ramin. Several small shops were badly damaged.
The Interior Ministry said police and civilians were among the dead and wounded. A Taliban commander, Mullah Hayat Khan, speaking by telephone from an undisclosed location, claimed responsibility.
The Taliban have claimed numerous other attacks on government workers. Suicide attacks used to be rare in Afghanistan but since the beginning of last year there have been about 70, most on foreign and government forces.
About 200 people have been killed, most of them civilians. Taliban insurgents have also been putting up fierce resistance in battles with foreign and government troops in the countryside, in particular in the south.
NATO, which will soon take command of most foreign troops across the whole country, has acknowledged it underestimated the scale of Taliban opposition.