Nearly 80 American soldiers were wounded and two Afghan civilians were killed in a Taliban truck bombing targeting an American base in eastern Afghanistan, NATO said today, a stark reminder that the war in Afghanistan still rages 10 years after the Sept 11 terror attacks against the United States.
The blast, which occurred late yesterday, shaved the facades from shops outside the Combat Outpost Sayed Abad in Wardak province and broke windows in government offices nearby, said Roshana Wardak, a former parliamentarian who runs a clinic in the nearby town of the same name.
The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack.
Eight wounded civilians were brought to Wardak’s clinic, two of them with wounds serious enough that they were sent to Kabul. She said one 3-year-old girl died of her wounds on the way to the clinic.
The attack was carried out by a Taliban suicide bomber who detonated a large bomb inside a truck carrying firewood, NATO said. It was unclear how many foreign and Afghan soldiers were serving on the base.
“Most of the force of the explosion was absorbed by the protective barrier at the outpost entrance,” NATO said, adding that the damage was repairable and that operations were continuing.
Fewer than 25 Afghan civilians were also wounded, NATO said, adding that none of the 77 injuries sustained by the Americans were life-threatening. Spokesman Maj Russell Fox said Sunday that all the international troops at the combat outpost are American.
