KABUL, July 19: Eight Afghan villagers and soldiers were injured last week when US-led forces blew up a heavy weapons store in Qarabagh district north of Kabul, an Afghan commander said on Monday.

Five civilians and three Afghan soldiers were injured on Friday when American troops dynamited a weapons depot 33 kilometres north of the city near US-led coalition headquarters at Bagram air base, Gen Abdul Rezaq said.

"The store was 500 metres away from the village of 300 families and the explosion injured eight people," the commander of the first brigade of the eighth military division said. Gen Rezaq said the heavy weapons had been stored in a house in the Qala-i-Mossa village that was too near the village to be blown up safely. -AFP