Suicide car bomb kills Afghan civilian

(Adds Taliban claim of responsibility)

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan, March 12 (Reuters) - A suicide car bomber hit a NATO-led convoy on Wednesday in Afghanistan's southern city of Kandahar, killing one Afghan civilian, but causing no casualties among the force, a NATO spokesman said. NATO soldiers cordoned off the site of the attack, which targeted Canadian forces, and smoke could be seen rising from a house located nearby, witnesses said.

The Taliban Islamist movement which is leading an insurgency to overthrow the pro-Western government and eject foreign forces claimed responsibility for the attack, a spokesman said.

Afghanistan has faced rising violence in the past two years, the bloodiest period since U.S.-led and Afghan forces overthrew the Taliban government in late 2001.

More than 150 people, many of them civilians, were killed in two separate suspected suicide attacks last month in Kandahar, the former main stronghold for the al Qaeda-backed Taliban.

(Writing by Sayed Salahuddin; Editing by Jeremy Laurence)