AFGHANISTAN: Bus Bomb Kills 25 Civilians in South
A bomb blast tore through a crowded passenger bus Wednesday on a desert highway in southern Afghanistan, killing 25 of those on board and injuring about 20 others, some seriously, government officials said. All were said to be civilians.
Afghan and Western officials quickly denounced the insurgency for the planting of homemade bombs along roads heavily used by noncombatants. So-called improvised explosive devices, or IEDs, are usually aimed at Afghan and NATO forces, but often wind up maiming and killing civilians instead.
About 7,000 Afghan civilians were killed by bombs from 2004 to '09, according to classified military documents posted on the Internet this week by the advocacy group WikiLeaks.
The bus, whose passengers included women and children, was traveling on a main road in Nimruz province, bound for the capital, Kabul, when it struck the buried bomb. Many Afghans cannot afford cars and are reliant on poorly maintained, jampacked passenger buses and minivans, especially for travel between major cities. Los Angeles Times (29 July 2010)