Suicide bomber strikes near US base in Kabul

KABUL (AFP) - A suicide bomber struck near a US military base in Kabul on Tuesday injuring at least nine Afghans, police and the NATO force said, just days ahead of a global summit on tackling a Taliban-led insurgency.
The attacker detonated a car packed with explosives as a convoy of foreign forces passed near the main gate of Camp Phoenix, a US military base in Kabul on the main road out of the capital to the eastern provinces. The Taliban, who are waging an increasingly deadly insurgency to topple the Afghan government and oust foreign troops, claimed responsibility.
We carried out the bombing. The target was foreign forces, their spokesman Zabihullah Mujahed told AFP by phone from an undisclosed location.
Kabul police chief Abdul Rahman Rahman said nine Afghan civilians including three who worked as interpreters for the foreign forces were injured.
There was a suicide car bomb attack near Camp Phoenix. The suicide attacker detonated his car close to an international forces convoy, he said.
NATOs International Security Assistance Force said in a statement it was aware of an explosion outside the main gate of Camp Phoenix that occurred this afternoon at approximately 5:00 pm (1230 GMT).
Initial reports indicate the cause of the explosion was a vehicle-borne IED, the force said, referring to an improvised explosive device in a car.
The bombing comes just over a week after seven Taliban gunmen armed with suicide vests launched an attack on civilian and government buildings near the presidential palace in Kabul, killing five people.
Meanwhile, four policemen were shot dead in southern Afghanistan on Tuesday, an official said, suggesting the killings were carried out by Taliban insurgents.
The bullet-ridden bodies of the Afghan officers were found in the city of Lashkar Gah, capital of the Taliban-infested province of Helmand.
They seem like they were killed overnight by someone, maybe Taliban, at the their post, said Daud Ahmadi, a provincial government spokesman. We dont see any signs that they were killed in fighting.
The officers weapons and a police vehicle were also missing from the post at the gate of a government building in the centre of the city, he said.
Taliban militants have been blamed for several such incidents in the past.
The Taliban were in government between 1996 and 2001, when they were ousted in a US-led invasion, and are waging a guerrilla-style insurgency to topple the current government and force foreign troops out of Afghanistan.