A suicide car bomb exploded next to a Nato convoy in southern Afghanistan today, and troops speeding away from the scene shot at several civilian cars, officials said.

Nato troops killed 48 suspected militants in three separate battles in southern Afghanistan.

US-led coalition troops kiled seven suspected Taliban militants in southern Afghanistan as Australia announced today that six of its special forces soldiers were wounded in the same area earlier this month.

Afghan gunmen today killed an Afghan worker and wounded three others building a road to a US-led coalition base in the south of the country.

Two suicide car bombers launched a failed attack on a US military convoy in southern Afghanistan today, killing only themselves, police said.

TALIBAN fighters simultaneously attacked two police checkpoints on a southern Afghan highway, and up to 14 militants were killed or wounded in the ensuing gun battle, an official said yesterday.

An Iranian vice-president today rejected a US contention that his country was fanning Muslim anger over the Prophet Mohammed cartoons, while a newspaper in Malaysia faced closure for printing one of the images.

MUSLIM protests against cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed claimed three more lives yesterday when Afghan police fired at a crowd trying to storm a US military base.

Suspected Taliban militants have beheaded a teacher in a central Afghan town, the latest in a string of attacks on teachers and schools in the volatile region, officials said today.

A spate of assaults by suspected Taliban rebels killed eight policemen and wounded an election candidate, and Afghanistan warned today that aid workers and other “soft” targets were in danger of attack ahead of elections this month.

Fear of attack by Taliban-led rebels kept many candidates off the streets today as Afghanistan kicked off the official campaign period for landmark September 18 legislative elections, the war-torn country’s next step toward democracy.

Suspected Taliban militants ambushed and killed six Afghans today as they were transporting the body of a government engineer who was killed on Wednesday in another deadly rebel attack, officials said.

MORE than 100,000 Afghan and foreign security forces were on high alert yesterday on the eve of the country's first direct presidential election after more than two decades of war.

More than 100,000 Afghan and foreign security forces were on high alert today on the eve of the country’s first direct presidential election after more than two decades of war.

The bullet-riddled bodies of five government soldiers were found in southern Afghanistan today, a day after they were abducted by suspected Taliban, an Afghan official said.

US-led forces killed three insurgents in a gunbattle at a cave complex in southeastern Afghanistan, the American military said today.

SUSPECTED Taliban fighters attacked a government checkpoint and ambushed another group of Afghan soldiers along the main road linking the south with the capital, killing at least eight soldiers, Afghan officials said yesterday.