Afghan governor blames Pakistan for recent spate of suicide attacks

Kabul: An Afghan provincial governor accused Pakistan of training and equipping Taliban suicide bombers who have killed at least 33 people in southern Kandahar province since Sunday.

Escalating violence is causing some Nato members to agonise over plans to send more peacekeeping troops to the south to allow US-led forces to trim their presence there.

"The suicide bombers are trained and equipped by Pakistan and then sent to Afghanistan for sabotage activities," Assadullah Khalid, Kandahar's governor, said.

"Pakistan is sheltering and allowing senior Taliban officials on its soil, and in some cases the suicide bombers are even Pakistani nationals," said Khalid.

"Since all the senior Taliban have got their houses there and use some of them as training camps then the government should know what is going on."

Afghan officials and US military commanders in Afghanistan often criticise Pakistan for not doing more to stop insurgents, although Pakistan rejects the criticism and has deployed close to 80,000 troops on the long and porous border.

The Kandahar governor's comments come on the heels of similar remarks by President Hamid Karzai. Karzai said on Sunday he had intelligence reports months ago that suicide attackers were being trained in frontier areas and most attacks were carried out by "foreigners".

A 15-year-old suicide bomber killed five people in Kandahar city on Monday, hours before another bomber killed 23 in Spin Boldak, a town in the same province bordering Pakistan.

On Sunday, a Canadian diplomat and two civilians were killed and three Canadian soldiers and nine locals were wounded in a suicide attack on a military convoy.

Rangeen Dadfar Spanta, an adviser to Karzai, said the suicide attacks were aimed at frightening Nato.

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