KANDAHAR - A suicide attacker detonated a car bomb in the southern Afghan province of Kandahar on Monday, killing five children and injuring one other, a police official told AFP.

"Five children were killed in the first blast and one child is wounded," said Kandahar deputy police chief Fazel Mohammad Shairzad.

The car bomb was followed by a roadside bomb explosion 10 metres (yards) away, after police arrived at the scene, and wounded two policemen, said district criminal investigations chief Mohammad Hussain.

The suicide bomber was targeting Dand district governor Ahmadullah Nazick, but the explosives detonated prematurely, the Kandahar provincial government said in a statement.

Nazick had been travelling in a convoy along a road in Dand.

An AFP reporter said the dead children were immediately taken away in body bags, leaving charred body parts of the suicide attacker and small pools of blood at the scene.

In recent months, targeted assassinations have become increasingly common in restive Kandahar, birthplace of the Taliban movement, and in Dand district alone at least nine members of the council have been killed.

BDST: 12.29 HRS, August 02, 2010