A suicide car bomb exploded near the main gate to a massive NATO military base in the southern city of Kandahar on Monday, wounding 14 Afghans, an army general said.
The attacker blew up a minivan filled with explosives at an Afghan security checkpoint about 50 metres (yards) from an entrance to the Kandahar Air Field, Afghan army corps commander General Shair Mohammad Zazai told AFP.
"Twelve civilians and two Afghan National Army soldiers were wounded," he said.
The attacker did not intend to enter the base but was headed to Kandahar city, about 10 kilometres (six miles) away, when he was stopped at the checkpoint -- on a main road into Afghanistan from Pakistan, the general said.
He detonated the car bomb while in a queue to be searched.
The airfield is one of the biggest bases in Afghanistan for the tens of thousands of foreign soldiers deployed to help the fragile Afghan government fight a growing insurgency led by the extremist Taliban.
The NATO-led International Security Assistance Force confirmed the explosion but said its troops were not directly affected by the blast.
{{/usCountry}}The NATO-led International Security Assistance Force confirmed the explosion but said its troops were not directly affected by the blast.
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