KABUL, April 23: A group of 50 armed men attacked aid workers in Afghanistan's volatile southern province of Kandahar on Friday, setting fire to eight vehicles, but no casualties were immediately reported, Western aid workers said.

In the pre-dawn attack, the men burst into a compound of the Central Asia Development Group, a non-governmental organisation partly funded by the United States, in a Panjwai district village and torched the vehicles and destroyed equipment, they said.

CADG is involved in a major road reconstruction project in the area, they added. Afghan aid workers were in the compound at the time of the attack. Speaking to Reuters on condition of anonymity, the aid workers said they had received unconfirmed reports that another NGO base had been attacked late on Thursday in the same district.

General Salim Khan, a senior Kandahar city police official, said a team had been sent to the area to investigate reports of the attacks. But he could only confirm one raid and said it was unclear who carried it out. -Reuters