From Masoud Popalzai
KABUL, Afghanistan (CNN) — Ten schoolchildren and two soldiers with NATO’s International Security Assistance Force were killed Monday in a bombing in Afghanistan, officials said.
A police officer was also killed when a suicide bomber attacked a bazaar in Afghanistan’s eastern Paktia province, the Afghan Interior Ministry said.
The assailant, who was on a motorbike, detonated a device in the main bazaar of the Samkanai district, Interior Ministry spokesman Sediq Sediqqi said.
At least 16 others were wounded, Sediqqi said.
The two ISAF soldiers, whose names and nationalities were not released, were killed in the blast, ISAF spokesman Staff Sgt. Daniel Wallace said.
The Interior Ministry issued a statement saying Taliban insurgents were behind the bombing. But the Taliban did not immediately claim responsibility, as they often do after deadly blasts.
Paktia province has been a hotbed for insurgent attacks.
Last October, another suicide bomber plowed into the wall of a joint NATO-Afghan army base, wounding 45 Afghan soldiers, officials said. The Taliban claimed responsibility for that attack.
And in 2011, several suicide bombers attacked a government office in Paktia’s Samkanai district. Three Afghan police officers were killed.
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