An Afghan vice-president survived an assassination attempt today when a remotely controlled device was detonated near his convoy.
Mr Nematuallah Shahrani, one of four vice-presidents in the interim government of President Hamid Karzai, was in a convoy with other officials in the northern province of Kunduz when it was attacked, said the provincial governor.
Mr Karzai, favourite to win an October 9th presidential election, survived an assassination attempt last week when a rocket was fired at a helicopter he was in as it came in to land in the southeastern town of Gardez. The rocket missed.
Remnants of the Taliban and Islamic militant allies, including al-Qaeda, have been blamed for a wave of violence concentrated in the south and east of the country, in which about 1,000 people have been killed in the last year.
They have vowed to disrupt preparations for the presidential election.
Two soldiers from the US-led coalition hunting al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters were killed in a gunbattle in the southeastern province of Paktika, a traditional heartland for Islamic militants, the US military said.
Six Afghan soldiers had to be evacuated from the scene of the battle, although the US military, which leads a 17,000-strong multinational force in Afghanistan, did not give details of their wounds.