Suicide bomber detonates inside govt building in east Afghanistan

Jalalabad, Afghanistan, Sept 18 (AFP/APP):A suicide bomber detonated inside a government building in eastern Afghanistan on Wednesday, a provincial official said, with casualties feared in the latest violence to hit the war-torn country.

Witnesses and an AFP reporter also described hearing gunshots immediately after the blast at the electronic identification registration centre in Jalalabad, capital of Nangarhar province.

“I was in class when I heard a big explosion followed by intense gunfire,” said Mohammad Ullah, a teacher at a nearby school.

“The kids started crying so we had to vacate the school. We jumped over the walls to take the students to a safer place,” he told AFP.

“Security forces are in the area to rescue the staff,” said provincial spokesman Ataullah Khogyani.

No group immediately claimed the attack, and it was not clear how many people had been inside the centre — where Afghans can register for their national electronic identification cards, or “tazkiras” — at the time.