A bomb at a key border crossing between Pakistan and Afghanistan today killed at least six Afghans, including a woman and two boys, officials said.
The victims were civilians trying to enter Pakistan or return to Afghanistan through the Spin Boldak border crossing in southern Afghanistan's Kandahar province, police said. The explosion wounded 16 other people.
A wounded Afghan man is brought to a hospital after the explosion in Spin Boldak
The commander of Afghan border forces in the area said the bomb had been hidden in a water pot near a transport office.
Kandahar Governor Assadullah Khalid called it "an act of sabotage by the enemies of Afghanistan", a term officials commonly use to refer to Taliban guerrillas and their militant Islamist allies.
More than 1,000 people, most of them militants but including more than 50 US soldiers, have been killed in violence this year, the bloodiest period since US-led forces toppled the Taliban government in 2001.
The Taliban failed in their vow to derail September 18th elections, but the period since has seen more violence.
The government said its troops killed 31 insurgents in weekend fighting further east along the border with Pakistan, but the Taliban said only three guerrillas were wounded, while they killed 11 government troops.
In the southern province of Zabul, Afghan and allied foreign forces arrested a district level Taliban commander, Mullah Safar Mohammad, in Nobahar district on Monday night, a provincial spokesman said.
The Pakistani military also said it had killed up to 40 Islamist militants in clashes on the Pakistani side of the border since last week, about half of them foreigners.
The latest surge in violence began last week in the North Waziristan region, and a Pakistani military spokesman said seven government troops had been killed.