Taliban militants attacked government buildings in the south-eastern Afghan city of Khost today with suicide bombers, AK-47 rifles and rocket-propelled grenades, officials said.

A US soldier was among at least five people killed today by a suicide car bomb attack on a heavily guarded road between the German Embassy and a US military base in the Afghan capital Kabul.

Taliban militants stopped a bus travelling on Afghanistan’s main road through a wild and dangerous part of the country’s south, seized about 50 people on board and slaughtered around 30 of them, officials said today.

An Afghan human rights group said today that at least 88 people, including 20 women, were killed in a joint Afghan-US coalition military operation in western Afghanistan.

US-led troops attacked a compound where Taliban leaders were meeting in western Afghanistan, killing 30 militants, American and Afghan military officials said today.

About 3,200 US Marines are being told to prepare to go to Afghanistan to boost troop levels in preparation for an expected Taliban offensive in coming months, military officials said.

A Nato and Afghan operation to retake a Taliban-controlled town in southern Afghanistan has killed at least 12 Taliban fighters and two children, the Afghan Defence Ministry said today.

A soldier was killed in Afghanistan when an explosion struck a patrol of Nato-led troops, the alliance said in a statement.

A suicide bomber wearing an Afghan army uniform set off a huge explosion early today while trying to board a military bus in Kabul, killing 30 people and wounding 30, officials said. The Taliban claimed responsibility.

Afghanistan’s president abruptly cut short a speech today as police fired shots into the air in an attempt to restrain a crowd trying to enter, officials said.

Afghan security forces supported by Nato-led troops will soon launch an operation to recapture a southern town that was overrun by Taliban militants, an official said today.

Nato today said as many as 150 insurgents were killed in a battle in eastern Afghanistan after two large groups of fighters crossed the border from Pakistan.

A roadside bomb exploded next to an Afghan army vehicle, killing all six soldiers on board, while a separate bomb and gunfire attack left two Nato soldiers wounded, officials said today.

Warplanes dropped bombs on suspected Taliban fighters hiding in orchards in a major Afghan-Nato offensive that the alliance said killed more than 200 militants in southern Afghanistan. Four Canadian soldiers were killed.

US-led coalition forces and Afghan police killed 20 suspected Taliban in the latest fighting to hit southern Afghanistan, as NATO today prepared to take command in the insurgency-wracked region.

Afghan authorities have completed their search for the bodies of more than 100 people who died last month when an airliner slammed into a mountain during a snowstorm, an official said today.

Nato soldiers found human remains, but no survivors, in the wreckage of an Afghan airliner, days after it struck a snowbound peak with 104 people on board.

An explosion at a construction company that killed 25 people and destroyed dozens of homes was today believed to be the work of al Qaida terrorists.

A mortar shell slammed into a school near Kabul today, killing a child and injuring about 30 others, a government spokesman said.