KABUL: A suicide bomber rammed an explosives-filled car into the gates of the Indian embassy in Afghanistan on Monday, killing more than 40 people including four Indian nationals, officials said.
The blast in the heart of Kabul scattered human flesh and severed limbs outside the embassy of India, one of Afghanistan's staunchest allies as the war-torn country battles an increasingly bloody Taliban insurgency.
A spokesman for the hardliners however denied the Taliban were involved in the attack, the deadliest in Kabul since the insurgency began after the Taliban regime was removed in a US-led invasion in late 2001.
"We have not done this," spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said.
Indian Ambassador Jayan Prasad, who was not hurt in the attack, confirmed reports that four Indian nationals were among the dead.
The Indian foreign ministry said meanwhile that two Indian paramilitary troopers guarding the embassy were killed in what the Afghan interior ministry said was a suicide car bombing.
"We are walking on rubble," a senior embassy official said soon after the blast. "The embassy has been blown up badly, the outer structures," he said on condition of anonymity.
"Initial reports indicate that about 40 people, mostly civilians who had come here for visas, have been killed," interior ministry spokesman Najib Nikzad said.
"More than 40 people, mostly civilians, have been killed," he reiterated to a reporter separately. About 10 Afghan police officers in charge of embassy security were among the dead and wounded, he said.
Health ministry spokesman Abdullah Fahim said earlier hospitals had reported they had 28 bodies and had treated 141 wounded.
Reporters were held back from the scene but a correspondent saw a mound of rubble at the gate of the facility, which is close to the interior ministry.
The powerful morning rush-hour blast sent a plume of brown smoke into the air and could be heard across the city centre. It shattered the windows of shops several hundred metres (yards) away, the correspondent said.
Afghan Foreign Minister Rangeen Dadfar Spanta visited the embassy soon after the attack to show support, his spokesman Sultan Ahmad Baheen said.
"The enemies of Afghanistan and India's relationship cannot hamper our relationship by conducting such attacks," Baheen said.
India has provided significant support to Afghanistan's efforts to restore order after the ouster of the Islamic extremist Taliban movement, which seized power in 1996 until they were pushed out.
Since being ousted from power after refusing to hand over Osama bin Laden in the wake of the September 11 attacks, the Taliban have waged a deadly campaign to try to undermine the Afghan government.
Targets have included international and US-led coalition troops from the tens of thousands of foreign forces trying to help President Hamid Karzai restore stability, but attacks have been increasing in Kabul itself.
One of the most daring in the city was on April 27, when militants opened fire on President Karzai as he was about to address the country's largest annual military parade.
A parliamentarian and two other other Afghans were killed, but the president was unhurt.
