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A car bomb killed at least 13 people and injured dozens of others attending a wrestling match at a local stadium in Afghanistan’s southern Helmand province on Friday.
No group has yet claimed responsibility for the attack.
AFP news agency quoted officials saying 13 people had been killed, while Reuters put the death toll at 14. The number of injured stood at around 45, according to provincial governor spokesman Omar Zwak.
The suicide attack occurred as people were leaving the stadium in Lashkar Gah, the capital of Helmand province, one of Afghanistan's main opium crop regions.
The driver of the car detonated his bomb after he was prevented from entering the venue, Zwak said. "The bomber wanted to go inside the stadium but he was identified by the police and he detonated himself."
Witnesses said the match was part of celebrations for Nawrooz, the Persian New Year holiday that some fundamentalist Muslims consider un-Islamic, and was attended by local officials.
President Ashraf Ghani, whose government has been lambasted for its inability to protect ordinary Afghans, condemned the attack against "innocent people", according to a statement.
Helmand is largely controlled by the Taliban, which has been resurgent since the withdrawal of US-led NATO combat troops at the end of 2014.
Despite calls for the group to sit down with the Afghan government, it has given so far only a muted response.
Friday’s attack caps a bloody few days in Afghanistan as Taliban and Islamic State militants ramp up attacks even before the official start of the spring fighting season.
In Kabul on Wednesday, a suicide bomber blew himself up among a crowd of people celebrating Nawrooz, killing 33 people and wounding 65, according to the health ministry, many of them teenagers.
IS's local franchise in Afghanistan claimed responsibility for the assault in the heavily Shiite neighbourhood – the fifth suicide bombing in the Afghan capital in recent weeks.
(REUTERS)
