ASADABAD (Afghanistan), Aug 31: At least 10 people were killed when rockets fired by Taliban at a US base in Kunar hit a nearby village on Friday, while two Afghan soldiers died in a suicide bombing outside Kabul airport.

“The Taliban fired several rockets on the base but they fell short and landed on civilian homes,” police official Abdul Sabour Allahyar told AFP. Another five people were wounded in the attack in Chawkai district.

“There’s a base up there which received 10 rounds in indirect fire. We did not return fire,” coalition spokesman Sergeant Dean Welch said.

Earlier, a suicide attacker rammed his explosives-packed car nose-to-nose with an

international military vehicle which was leaving the Nato military gate of Kabul airport.

The vehicle did not explode immediately and the foreign car sped off before the blast, which caught a group of Afghan soldiers preparing to fly to Italy for military training, witnesses said.

One of the soldiers, aged in his late 20s, was killed, said Sergeant Aminullah, an Afghan soldier. Another died later of his wounds, a defence ministry official said.

About nine other Afghans, two of them civilians, were wounded, officials said.

The International Security Assistance Force said the incident injured five of its troops. Brussels and Berlin said they were four Belgians, who had been guarding the gate, and a German.

Blood-spattered military boots and caps littered the scene where the other soldiers, who numbered about 30 and appeared shocked, waited with their bags, a reporter said.

Sergeant Aminullah said the soldiers had been due to spend a month in Italy being trained in the mountains.Taliban claimed responsibility for the blast.—AFP