Suicide bomber kills 17 Afghan civilians

KABUL, July 10 (Reuters) A suicide bomber killed 17 civilians, including 12 school children, today, the Interior Ministry said, in an attack apparently aimed at Dutch troops patrolling a crowded bazaar in the south of the country.

Some 30 people, including seven Dutch soldiers, were wounded in the attack in the small town of Deh Rawud in Uruzgan province, officials said. The Interior Ministry said some of the wounded were in a critical condition.

The Dutch Defence Ministry said one of its soldiers was also in a critical condition. All the wounded had been evacuated to a military hospital in the provincial capital Tarin Kot.

A spokeswoman for the NATO-led force in Kabul said six Afghan civilians were killed and 13 wounded.

''This is an indiscriminate use of a Taliban extremist bomb which has killed and injured both civilians and soldiers,'' said Lieutenant-Colonel Mike Smith, the NATO forces spokesman for southern Afghanistan.

Taliban insurgents have stepped up the number of suicide attacks against the nearly 50,000 foreign troops in Afghanistan this year after suffering heavy casualties in conventional attacks.

Some 6,000 people have been killed, including 1,500 civilians, in Afghanistan in the last 18 months.

REUTERS PY ND1826