Afghanistan's Kandahar hit by suicide bombers, 30 dead

At least 30 people have been killed and 40 wounded in four suspected suicide bombings in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar, hospital officials say.

The first blast happened at about 2000 (1530 GMT). Police said the attackers struck near a prison, a hotel, a mosque and at a city centre road junction.

Kandahar, a former Taliban stronghold, is one of Afghanistan's largest cities.

The US has hinted that the volatile area could be one of the next targets for operations against the Taliban.

The BBC's Quentin Sommerville, in Kabul, says Kandahar is the Taliban's "spiritual home".

Previous attacks in Kandahar province have been blamed on Taliban insurgents, who have regularly launched suicide car bomb attacks.

Buildings damaged

President Karzai's half-brother Ahmad Wali Karzai, who is the head of Kandahar's provincial council, was quoted as saying that the main attack was on Kandahar's prison.

In June 2008 a suicide bomber blew apart the Kandahar prison gates and a nearby checkpoint, freeing hundreds of prisoners, many of them suspected insurgents.

But Ahmed Wali Karzai said this time, the walls of the prison were not breached, but that nearby buildings were badly damaged.

The head of the city's main hospital, Abdul Qayyum Pukhla, was quoted as saying that both civilians and police were among the dead in the attacks.

Western troops were assisting at the request of Afghan authorities, said Major Macen Waoczak, a spokesman for the Nato-led International Security Assistance Force.

Earlier on Saturday a roadside bomb killed six people travelling in a civilian vehicle in the capital of Uruzgan province in central Afghanistan

The blasts came as Nato and Afghan forces continued a major operation against Taliban militants in neighbouring Helmand province.

The top US commander in Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal, has hinted in recent weeks that the Kandahar area could be one of the next targets for operations against the Taliban.