Bombing in Helmand; 17 dead, 47 wounded

Afghan civilians yesterday suffered a devastating bombing (the country's third-most fatal) in Lashkar Gah, the capital of Helmand. Only two incidents in the past have caused so many fatalities, and each were suicide bombings in Kandahar. A Minnesota TV station has posted a video clip of the aftermath here (skip the ad).

Helmand, unlike Kandahar (17 attacks since 2005) and Kabul (7), has rarely been struck by suicide bombs. A government spokesman, the UN, and NATO all described the bomb as a suicide attack, while a Taliban spokesman has claimed that it was a remote-controlled bomb instead.

Suicide bomb kills 17, hurts 47 at market
LASHKAR GAH, (AP) — A suicide bomber targeting a former police chief blew himself up in a busy town market Monday in southern Afghanistan, killing 17 people and wounding 47. The Taliban claimed responsibility but in a rare move expressed sadness over the deaths of civilians...

Qari Yousaf Ahmadi, who claims to speak for the Taliban, said Monday's bombing was not a suicide attack but a remote-controlled bomb that had targeted a former Lashkar Gah police chief because he had served under the pro-communist government during the Soviet occupation of the 1980s. The former chief, who runs the market where the blast occurred, and his son were killed. 

In general, one should be skeptical of incident reports in Helmand, as attacks attributed to Taliban insurgents are sometimes the result of criminal violence instead (Helmand is a primary poppy producing region.) But this attack appears to be insurgency-elated, and Karzai today declared, without elaboration, that it had been carried out "at the instruction of foreigners."