KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (Reuters) - Eight Afghan civilians, three of them children, were killed in two landmine explosions near the border with Pakistan, a senior provincial police official said on Thursday.
In Wednesday's incident, a vehicle carrying the civiliansran over a mine on a dirt road near Spin Boldak, a town inKandahar province, Kandahar police chief Sayed Aqa Saqib toldReuters.
"In the first explosion, three civilians lost their lives.The second one went off after the remaining people in the cargot out to recover the bodies. In total, eight people werekilled and several were wounded," he said.
Saqib said the mines were planted by Taliban insurgents wholargely rely on suicide attacks and roadside bomb blasts intheir campaign against the government and foreign troopsbacking it.
The Taliban could not be contacted immediately for comment.
Afghanistan is strewn with millions of landmines, a legacyof three decades of war, beginning with the invasion by theformer Soviet Union.
Landmines and unexploded ordnance kill or maim severaldozen people monthly in Afghanistan, according to the UnitedNations.
(Writing by Sayed Salahuddin; editing by Bill Tarrant)
