KABUL
A suicide bomber killed six people, including four civilians, and wounded 24 others in the southern province of Kandahar on Saturday.
Javed Faisal, spokesman for the Kandahar governor, told Anadolu Agency that the suicide attacker had been on foot.
He detonated his explosives outside the New Kabul Bank in Kandahar's 2nd district, capital city of the province, Faisal said.
The spokesman added that the attack had been carried out at around 11am Saturday morning, when a group of civilians and government employees were standing on line to withdraw money from the bank.
He said that six people – including four civilians, one policeman and a bank guard – had been killed in the attack, and 24 people, including a number of civilians, had been injured.
All the wounded were transferred to the city's main hospital, he added.
"Since Kandahar is a key province for the enemy, they always tried to carry out satanic activities, but such attacks have decreased due to the increasing positive efforts of our security forces," the spokesman said.
Bahar Ali, a Kandahar resident and witness to today's attack, said he had been walking to a nearby shop when the attack occurred.
"I was going to buy things when suddenly there was a huge sound and smoke," he told AA by phone.
"I was not very far from that place, but Almighty Allah saved me," he added, thankfully. "I just saw the smoke and heard the screams of the people and ran away from the scene."
Ali also said that before the attack, he saw numerous policemen standing in line outside the bank.
No group has yet claimed responsibility for the attack.
In February 2011, a Taliban suicide team attacked a group of Afghan policemen standing in line outside the Kabul Bank in Jalalabad city, Ningrahar province, killing 42 people, including both police and civilians.
Kandahar province, which shares a 441-kilometer border with Pakistan, was the birthplace of the Taliban movement before it came to power.
The province became a bastion of the Taliban regime, which ruled Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001.
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