A suicide car bomb in the Afghan capital, Kabul, has killed and injured dozens of people.

The blast in a mainly Shia district in the west of the city struck a bus carrying government employees from the ministry of mines.

The Taliban said they had carried out the attack. </s> KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — The Latest on the suicide car attack in a western neighborhood of Kabul (all times local):

An Afghan government official says the death toll from a suicide car bombing in a western neighborhood of Kabul has climbed to 24.

The official says 42 people were wounded in the attack early on Monday morning. Kabul police chief spokesman Basir Mujahed says the bomber targeted a bus carrying employees of the mines and petroleum ministry.

He said all the dead and wounded are civilians. The suicide bomber rammed his car into a minibus carrying the government employees.

The Interior Ministry in a statement called the attack a “criminal attack against humanity.”

No one has claimed responsibility for the attack but in the past, both the Taliban and the Islamic State affiliate in Afghanistan has staged assaults in the Afghan capital.

An Afghan government official says the death toll in a suicide car bombing in a western neighborhood of Kabul has climbed to 12. Another 10 people were injured in the early Monday morning attack, said Interior Ministry spokesman Najib Danish. All the dead and wounded were civilians, he said.

Eyewitnesses said the suicide bomber seemed to target a minibus. It wasn’t known whether the bus carried government employees but Danish said police were on the scene investigating.

No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack.

An Afghan health ministry official says two people were killed and another two injured in a suicide car bomb attack in a western neighborhood of Kabul early Monday morning.

Health ministry spokesman Waheed Majrooh told The Associated Press two people died in the explosion along with the suicide bomber. Another two people were hurt, although the extent of their injuries was not immediately known.

Several prominent political leaders, such as Hazara leader Mohammad Mohaqiq, live in western Kabul.

The area has been the scene of several attacks including the suicide attack that killed prominent Shiite Muslim cleric Ramazan Hussainzada last month. Hussainzada was also a senior leader of Afghanistan’s Hazara community. </s> KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) – The Taliban have claimed responsibility for a horrific attack in the Afghan capital that killed 24 people and wounded 42.

A statement released to the media by the Taliban says they carried out the suicide car bombing.

The early morning attack targeted a bus carrying employees of the mines and petroleum ministry.

The statement, sent by Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid, says the target of the bombing was the intelligence services and their employees.

He claimed the bus was filled with employees of the intelligence services but Kabul police chief spokesman Basir Mujahed said the employees worked for the mines and petroleum ministry.

Mujahid said Taliban insurgents had spent the last two months shadowing the intelligence services before carrying out the attack. </s> KABUL (Reuters) - A Taliban suicide attacker detonated a car bomb in the western part of Kabul on Monday, killing up to 35 people and wounding more than 40, government officials said, in one of the worst attacks in the Afghan capital in recent weeks.

Police cordoned off the area, located near the house of the deputy government Chief Executive Mohammad Mohaqiq in a part of the city where many of the mainly Shi’ite Hazara community live.

Monday’s suicide bombing, which targeted government personnel, continued the unrelenting violence that has killed more than 1,700 civilians in Afghanistan so far this year.

The Taliban, which is battling the Western-backed government and a NATO-led coalition for control of Afghanistan, has launched a wave of attacks around the country in recent days, sparking fighting in more than half a dozen provinces.

“I was in my shop when suddenly I heard a terrible sound and as a result all of my shop windows shattered,” said Ali Ahmed, a resident in the area of Monday’s blast.

Acting Interior Ministry spokesman Najib Danish said at least 24 people had been killed and 40 wounded but the casualty toll could rise further.

Another senior official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk about the incident with the media, said the toll stood at 35 killed. That was in line with a claim on Twitter by Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid, who said 37 “intelligence workers” had been killed.

Mujahid said in a tweet claiming responsibility for the attack the target had been two buses that had been under surveillance for two months.

Government security forces said a small bus owned by the Ministry of Mines had been destroyed in the blast but the National Directorate for Security, the main intelligence agency, said none of its personnel had been hit.

Three civilian vehicles and 15 shops were destroyed or damaged in the blast, the Interior Ministry said in a statement.

At least 1,662 civilians had already been killed in Afghanistan in the first half of the year.

Kabul has accounted for at least 20 percent of all civilian casualties this year, including at least 150 people killed in a massive truck bomb attack at the end of May, according to United Nations figures.

The Islamic State group claimed an attack on a mosque in the capital two weeks ago that killed at least four people.

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On Sunday, dozens of Afghan troops were under siege after Taliban fighters overran a district in northern Faryab province, a spokesman for the provincial police said.

There was also fighting in Baghlan, Badakhshan, and Kunduz provinces in Afghanistan’s north, and Kandahar, Helmand, and Uruzgan in the south, according to officials.

The resurgence of violence also coincides with the U.S. administration weighing up its strategic options for Afghanistan, including the possibility of sending more troops to bolster the NATO-led training and advisory mission already helping Afghan forces. </s> One person was killed and 14 bystanders were wounded after a suicide car bomber struck on Friday in the Afghan capital of Kabul, officials said. No group immediately claimed responsibility. The cause of the explosion was a car bomb in the city’s Qabl Bai area, according to Interior Ministry spokesman Najib Danish. The intended target was not clear, but a statement from the Australian Foreign Ministry said the explosion had occurred near Australian embassy vehicles as they were traveling in the city. It said no one from the embassy had been harmed, Reuters reports. </s> KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AP) — A local police chief in Afghanistan says a suicide car bombing targeted Afghan soldiers lining up outside a bank in southern Helmand province, killing at least 15 people.

Provincial police chief Gen. Agha Noor Kentoz says the attacker struck on Thursday in Lashkargah, the provincial capital. He says at least a dozen people were wounded in the explosion outside a Kabul Bank branch.

People likely had gathered there to collect salaries ahead of the upcoming holiday of Eid al-Fitr.

Haji Moladad Tobagar, health director in Lashkargah told The Associated Press that the hospital received 25 bodies after the attack, as well as 60 wounded.

He says he fears an even higher casualty toll as more victims were being brought in. The discrepancies in the casualty tolls could not immediately be reconciled. </s> KABUL (AA): A suicide car bombing aimed at a U.S. military convoy killed at least four civilians in the Afghan capital Kabul, an official confirmed on Friday.

The attack took place in the Wazeer Qala area on a highway to the city of Jalalabad to the east of Kabul during the morning rush-hour, Interior Ministry Spokesman Nusrat Rahimi told Anadolu Agency.

A suicide car packed with explosives rammed into an armored U.S. military convoy, killing four civilians in the vicinity and injuring three others, he said.

The NATO-led Resolute Support mission has yet to comment on the attack, though the local BBC Pashto reported at least four American soldiers were also injured in the bombing claimed by the Taliban.

In a statement posted on the social media, the insurgents claimed that 10 foreign soldiers have been killed and two armored vehicles destroyed.

The attack comes a day after an identical assault by Daesh militants on the Marshal Fahim National Defense University in Kabul that killed six people. </s> At least 35 people have been killed and more than 40 wounded after a suicide car bomb targeted a bus carrying ministry staff in Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan, officials said.

Intelligence officials told Al Jazeera that the bus was carrying staff of the Ministry of Mines and Petroleum when it came under attack on Monday.

The attack happened just before 7am local time (02:30 GMT) and took place close to the house of the deputy government Chief Executive Mohammad Mohaqi, said officials.

The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack in a statement sent to Al Jazeera.

The bus was destroyed, along with three other cars and several shops in the area, said Kabul's police chief spokesman, Basir Mujahed, adding children were among the wounded.

READ MORE: UN condemns jump in Afghan civilian deaths

Najib Danish, an acting interior ministry spokesman, added that the casualty toll could rise.

"It was a very loud blast, and my shop is completely destroyed," Baqi Mohammadi told Al Jazeera.

"The Taliban has attacked innocent people. Who has ever benefited from killing innocent people?"

Spokesman Mujahed said the "bomber struck at one of the busiest times of the day".

"There were traffic jams with people going to work and to the university and schools. Many of the shops had just opened," said Mujahed.

Al Jazeera's Jennifer Glasse, reporting from Kabul, said the Hazara community had called a demonstration for Monday to commemorate a suicide bombing that killed 84 in the same area on July 23 last year.

The Hazaras are one of Afghanistan's largest ethnic minorities, accounting for up to 20 percent of Afghanistan's 30 million inhabitants.

The demonstration was postponed because of security risks.

"Security has been very tight in Kabul," she said. "This morning, new barrier gates went up that limit the height of trucks coming into the city."

Hazaras are often the target of sectarian violence in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

One-year anniversary

On Monday, Kabul's Hazara community was due to mark the one-year anniversary of an attack in the capital that killed 84 and wounded more than 300 people, mostly members of the ethnic minority.

That attack was the first in Afghanistan claimed by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS) group, which has since carried out multiple attacks targeting the country's Shia minority.

The latest suicide bombing adds to the unrelenting violence in Afghanistan, where at least 1,662 civilians were killed in the first half of the year.

Kabul is regularly rocked by suicide bombs and attacks. A recent UN report showed that attacks on the capital accounted for nearly one-fifth of all Afghan civilian casualties in the first half of 2017.

READ MORE: Desperate journeys - Persecuted Hazara flee Afghanistan

Many died in a single devastating attack in Kabul in late May when a truck bomb exploded, also during the morning rush hour, killing more than 150 people and injuring hundreds.

The UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan put the civilian death toll at 92, saying it was the deadliest incident to hit the country since 2001.

NATO's combat mission in Afghanistan ended three years ago, handing sole responsibility to the country's security forces, which have also suffered casualties as they try to beat back the Taliban and contain the growing threat from the ISIL group.

Kabul has accounted for at least 20 percent of all civilian casualties this year, including at least 150 people killed in the massive truck bomb attack at the end of May, according to UN figures. </s> At least 18 people killed in a suicide car bomb attack in a crowded area of the eastern city of Khost.

A suicide car bomber has attacked Afghan police providing security to US forces in eastern Afghanistan, killing at least 18 people, government officials said.

The bombing took place around 8:30am (04:00 GMT) on Saturday near a stadium and bus station in Khost City, Mubariz Zadran, a spokesman for the governor of Khost province, told Al Jazeera.

"Eighteen people were killed and 10 people injured, including two children," Zadran said. "The target of the attack was Afghan police and US forces, but most of the victims were civilians."

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the bombing.

Saturday was a public holiday in Afghanistan as it marked the first day of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

In clear defiance to a call by the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan for a ceasefire during Ramadan, the Taliban announced on Friday they would intensify their attacks during the month.

Separately, 10 civilians, including women and children, were killed and six others were wounded when a minibus hit a roadside bomb in Afghanistan's western Herat province on Friday.

The incident took place in Adraskan district of Herat on Friday morning, Abdul Ahad Walizada, a spokesman for the Herat provincial police, said on Saturday.
A suicide car bombing in the western part of Kabul kills at least 24 and injures more than 40 people. Afghan authorities say the target of the attack was a bus of civilian government workers from the Ministry of Mines and Petroleum.