A Taliban-style bomb attack blew up a vehicle, killing three Afghan tribal elders in the west of the country yesterday, police said.
The group were attacked in the western province of Farah, a troubled region packed with Taliban-linked insurgents and bandits waging a guerrilla war against the US-backed administration in Kabul.
"An IED (improvised explosive device) blast in Bala Buluk district of Farah province killed three and injured two civilians," said Abdul Rauf Ahmadi, police spokesman for western Afghanistan.
Provincial government spokesman Naqibullah Farahi told AFP that the victims were "local elders en route to Farah city from the district."
President Hamid Karzai strongly condemned the bombing and described the attackers as "the enemies of Afghanistan" a term Afghan officials use to refer to Taliban and other insurgents.
Afghanistan is in the grip of an increasingly deadly insurgency now into a 10th year. Led by Taliban leaders who were in power between 1996 and 2001, the insurgency is fighting to bring down Karzai.