Mayor Ghulam Haidar Hamidi was killed when a suicide bomber detonated his explosives in a corridor near Hamidi's office, said Zalmay Ayoubi, spokesman for the Kandahar provincial governor. "It appears the bomber was carrying the bomb in his turban," Ayobi said. Kandahar Police Chief Abdul Razaq said the mayor was meeting some elders from a district of Kandahar city when one of them got close to the mayor and detonated a bomb hidden in his turban.

Motive unknown

The motive for the attack was not immediately known but Taliban rebels regularly use suicide strikes to attack foreign troops and Afghan officials associated with the Kabul government. Hamidi's death comes at a time when there is a dangerous power vacuum in the volatile Kandahar province which is the Taliban's birthplace and a focus of recent international efforts to turn the tide against the insurgency.

On July 12, Afghan President Hamid Karzai's half-brother, Ahmad Wali Karzai, was assassinated by a trusted family security guard at his home in Kandahar city. At a funeral service for Ahmad Wali Karzai, a suicide attacker, who appeared to have concealed his explosives inside a turban, killed a senior cleric and at least four other people in Kandahar.

Ahmed Wali was a key strongman and an alleged drugs baron who had substantial influence over Kandahar. His assassination was predicted to trigger a turf war for control over southern Afghanistan which could reverse recent security gains made by the US-led military coalition. Wali Karzai maintained an uneasy alliance with US forces because of his anti-Taliban credentials, but he was also accused of being a corrupt authoritarian who controlled a private militia.

Security transitions begin

According to a UN report, Kandahar was the site of over half of all targeted killings in Afghanistan between April and June this year. The latest in the series of killings comes after the first phase of security transitions from the NATO-led forces to Afghan troops. Seven parts of the country were ceremonially handed over to Afghan forces last week, although NATO officials say it will be up to two years before each area assumes full control for security and governance.

Critics have said the process is premature because Afghan forces are not well enough prepared to hold off the Taliban, and they say it is motivated by a political timetable as coalition nations start to bring some of their troops home. All Western combat troops are due to leave by the end of 2014.

Author: Manasi Gopalakrishnan (Reuters, afp)
Editor: Sarah Berning