Bombers strike hospital gate bazaar in south-west and food market in north where child vendors sold snacks, killing 39
Attacks on a packed bazaar in south-western Afghanistan and a food market in the north have killed nearly 40 people and injured over 70 others, almost all of them civilians, making Tuesday one of the bloodiest days in a summer of heavy violence.
In normally peaceful Nimroz province a team of suicide bombers struck around 3.30pm local time.
One targeted a hospital gate bazaar bustling with people buying food for their evening meal, and making preparations for this weekend's Eid holiday, which marks the end of the holy month of Ramadan.
At least 29 people died and more than 50 were injured, said Abdul Majid Latifi, head of the police's intelligence operation for the province. Of the dead, 24 were civilians, many of them women and children.
"There were around 100 people selling phone cards, fruits and other things in a small space on the street, every three or four metres a vendor," said Abdul Hadi Azizi, head of the province's criminal investigation department.
"Just imagine how many people must have been there with all the shoppers as well." Many of the wounded had serious injuries, so the toll was likely to rise, he added.
The attack was the deadliest that Nimroz province has endured in over 10 years of war, but both of the intelligence officials warned that it could have been far worse.
They disrupted a cell of 11 suicide attackers on Monday night, killing two in a village just outside the provincial capital, capturing three others, and confiscating a car packed with explosives and several guns and assault rifles.
"Last night the group suicide attackers were planing something for today, so we launched an operation," said Latifi. However police did not manage to track down the whole group.
Six suicide bombers escaped, but police shot three dead the next day before they could detonate their explosives. The one attacker who targeted the hospital gates caused most of the bloodshed; two policemen were also wounded by a separate explosion, Latifi added.
There was no immediately obvious motive for the attack in a sparsely-populated corner of Afghanistan with no foreign presence, nestled against the border with Iran.
It lies on a drug smuggling route, which brings some violence, but there has been little insurgent activity compared to neighbouring Helmand province. A Taliban spokesman declined to comment on whether the group were responsible for the attack.
"I don't think there was any flashpoint or target. They are just trying to make a disaster by killing civilians," said Shakila Hakimi, head of the provincial council.
The attacks came just days after two policemen shot dead nine of their comrades in an unprovoked attack in a northern corner of the province, a reminder of spreading violence.
In northern Kunduz province, just a few hours after the Nimroz attack, a motorbike packed with explosives was detonated in a small town's food market as people prepared to break the Ramadan fast.
"10 people were killed, and 21 injured, all civilians," said the provincial police chief, Samiullah Qatra, adding that among the victims were children who sold deep-fried potato pancakes and other popular snacks.
There are growing fears in Afghanistan that as western troops speed up a security handover to their Afghan counterparts, who are much less well-trained and equipped, the country will see a rise in violence.
The UN said this week that civilian casualties were around 5% higher in July than the same month of 2011. They had declined in the first half of the year but officials described the fall as a "hollow trend" linked to an exceptionally harsh winter, rather than evidence of improved security.
A rising toll in recent months would broadly fit with security data from the Nato-led coalition, which said that between April and June Taliban attacks on foreign and Afghan forces rose 11% from a year earlier.
• Additional reporting by Mokhtar Amiri