Afghan official killed in bombing

Suicide bomber targets deputy governor of Ghazni, a province hit by a sharp rise in violence levels.

Afghans inspect destroyed car of slain deputy governor
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The deputy governor was reportedly killed while riding in a car on his way to work. [REUTERS] 

The deputy governor of the eastern Ghazni province in Afghanistan has been killed in a suicide bombing along with his son, nephew and three bodyguards.

Mohammad Kazim Allahyar was on his way to work on Tuesday morning near the Ghazni airport when a man riding a motorcycle behind his car detonated a bomb, provincial police chief Delawar Zahid said.

Allahyar, his son and two bodyguards were killed instantly in the attack, while Allahyar’s nephew and a third bodyguard were mortally wounded.

Allahyar was riding in a two-car convoy when the attack took place, Zahid said.

Ghazni has seen one of the most drastic increases in violence over the past year, according to data collected by Al Jazeera. There were 570 attacks in the first half of 2010, compared to 269 last year.

Allahyar is the most prominent political official to be killed in this year’s election cycle. Afghanistan voted for a new parliament on September 18, but results have yet to be released.

New claims of civilian deaths

In the country’s northeastern Laghman Province, residents fleeing the village of Masamud told Al Jazeera on Tuesday that NATO forces had killed 13 civilians and wounded eight others in a nighttime raid on Sunday.

NATO has said that its forces killed 30 insurgents and one civilian during the raid, which took place in the province’s Alisheng District. President Hamid Karzai’s office is looking into the controversy.

Masamud residents told Al Jazeera that they had made an agreement with the Afghan government not to allow the Taliban into the area and had fired on NATO forces when they arrived, believing the agreement had been broken. That may have prompted a larger NATO assault, Al Jazeera’s Sue Turton reported.

Source: Al Jazeera