Suicide bomber hits Western troop convoy in Kabul

Afghan police try to douse fire after a suicide attack on a convoy of Western troops in Kabul August 25, 2007.

KABUL (Reuters) - A suicide car bomber struck a convoy of Western troops in the Afghan capital on Saturday and wounded two soldiers.

The attack happened on a road leading east from Kabul which is regularly used by NATO and U.S.-led troops.

Two foreign soldiers were taken to hospital after the blast, a spokesman for the NATO-led force said.

Violence has surged in Afghanistan in the past 19 months, the bloodiest period since U.S.-led troops toppled the Taliban government in 2001.

On Friday night, a rocket landed inside a hospital compound in Kabul but caused no casualties or damage, hospital officials said on Saturday.

Taliban insurgents occasionally fire rockets into Kabul although they rarely cause casualties. Friday's attack hit the Wazir Akbar Khan area of Kabul where many foreign embassies and aid organizations have their offices.

"It was 11 p.m. when a rocket hit inside the Wazir Akbar Khan compound," said a doctor who worked at the Wazir Akbar Khan hospital. "No one was wounded or killed, and the hospital received no damage. It hit a garden inside the hospital."

No group claimed responsibility for the attack.

Afghan troops killed 19 Taliban insurgents in clashes in Ghazni province, southwest of Kabul, on Friday, the provincial governor told Reuters on Saturday.

Six more Taliban rebels were killed when they ambushed a police patrol in the southeastern province of Paktika on Friday, the Interior Ministry said on Saturday.