KABUL: A suicide car bomber targeted foreign forces in Kabul on Friday but the device detonated early, slightly injuring an Afghan soldier, ISAF and city police said.

An International Security Assistance Force spokesman said the explosion happened near Camp Julien, which is located in the ruins of the former Afghan royal palace in the west of the city.

“According to initial reports it was a vehicle-borne IED (improvised explosive device),” the spokesman said. A later statement said the explosion happened as a troop convoy was passing.

Hundreds of police and soldiers were at the blast site with ambulances and firefighters, with the scene cordoned off, an AFP reporter said.

Kabul city police chief Mohammad Ayub Salangi told reporters: “At about 2:00 pm (0930 GMT) a suicide attacker driving a vehicle approached a coalition forces convoy near an Afghan National Army base in west Kabul.

“Fortunately it exploded before reaching the convoy. One Afghan National Army soldier was slightly injured. The coalition soldiers were not hurt. An investigation team is at the scene.”

The same road was the scene of a deadly suicide car bomb attack on a NATO convoy in May which killed 18 people, including five US soldiers, a Canadian soldier and 12 civilians in the deadliest strike on the capital in over a year.

The Taliban, which is leading a nearly nine-year insurgency against the Afghan government and its foreign backers, claimed responsibility.

Darul Aman Palace is near the American University of Afghanistan and the Kabul museum. There is also an Afghan army base nearby.

Kabul has suffered relatively lightly in recent months from the deadly guerrilla war being waged across Afghanistan against some 150,000 US and NATO troops. – AFP