AFGHANISTAN’S intelligence agency said last night it had thwarted a plot to assassinate President Hamid Karzai after arresting a bodyguard and five people with links to the Haqqani network and al-Qaida.

A suicide bomber has blown himself up in southern Afghanistan, killing one Afghan intelligence service officer and injuring three others.

A MAN suspected of involvement in the abduction of three UN workers in Afghanistan died in custody last week and authorities are investigating whether he was tortured to death, the Interior Ministry said yesterday.