Suspected bomber caught in Kabul

A suspected suicide bomber was thwarted by a traffic accident only 300 yards away from the US embassy in Kabul, a top Afghan intelligence official said today.

The man, who was caught yesterday after a car chase through the capital, had half-a-ton of explosives packed into his car.

Foreign intelligence information indicated that he is a foreigner and a member of Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaida, said Amonullah Barakzai, deputy director of the Afghan intelligence service.

‘‘He was on a suicide mission,’’ Barakzai said, but he said Afghan authorities were not sure whether his target was the embassy, other foreign installations, or the Afghan leadership.

President Hamid Karzai’s palace offices are little more than half-a-mile from the scene of the accident.

An Interior Ministry spokesman said late last night that a second unidentified man had also been arrested in the case.

But the intelligence official reported only the single arrest, and said investigators had not determined the man’s identity or nationality.