ISLAMABAD, Dec 21: Sixty-five people were killed on Thursday night when US planes bombed a convoy of Afghan elders, tribal chiefs and commanders heading for the inauguration of Afghanistan’s new government in Kabul.

Top US officials claimed that the convoy was carrying Taliban and Al-Qaeda leaders in eastern Afghanistan.

Warplanes attacked the vehicles on a road at Sato Kandaw, 25kms south of Gardez, the capital of Paktia province, they said.

Paktia is on the Pakistan frontier and also borders Nangarhar province, where US warplanes have carried out intense bombing raids over the past two weeks to force fighters of Osama bin Laden out of their mountain hideouts.

“Several Afghan elders, tribal chiefs and commanders were among the victims of the killings,” the Afghan Islamic Press (AIP) quoted Sayed Yaqeen, an official of the Paktia tribal council, as saying.

Fourteen vehicles in the convoy were totally destroyed and according to one source, the victims included militia commander Mohammadi Ibrahim, brother of the renowned Afghan commander Maulvi Jalaluddin Haqqani.

It said bombing of the region continued until Friday morning.

The group had left from the town of Khost, near Pakistan, and was to make a stopover in Gardez en route to Kabul for the inauguration.

“The convoy took an alternative route 25 kilometres from Gardez, which came under US attack several times,” Yaqeen said.

US officials in Washington said a convoy attacked south of Khost was carrying Taliban leaders and senior followers of Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden.

“It was a large convoy, and there were a lot of people killed and a lot of vehicles damaged, or destroyed,” Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said.

General Peter Pace, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, added: “We had some intelligence indicators that were cross referenced and determined by Central Command that in fact what we had was a convoy of vehicles, about 10 to 12 that contained leadership.”

EC-130 gunships, and fighter aircraft were launched from US carriers, Pace said, adding the operation took place near Khost. A command and control compound from which the convoy had departed was also hit, Pace said.—AFP