Suicide bombing outside Afghanistan hospital kills 27

A suicide car bomber killed at least 27 people at a hospital in eastern Afghanistan on Saturday, many of them women and children in the maternity ward.

The attack about 25 miles east of Kabul, the capital, was one of the deadliest in Afghanistan this year. Afghan authorities reported conflicting casualty numbers, ranging from 27 to 40 dead and 23 to 53 injured. Officials said more bodies were being recovered from the debris, and the death toll could rise significantly.

The bombing occurred in the Azra district of the eastern province of Lowgar, Afghan authorities said. The attacker, driving a black sport utility vehicle, first targeted the Azra district police headquarters but was confronted by officers, district police chief Bakhtiyar Gul Ashrafi said.

The assailant then drove toward a nearby 40-bed hospital filled with patients, visitors and staff members, detonating his explosives outside, Ashrafi said. The blast leveled the maternity ward and much of the rest of the building, trapping scores of people under the rubble.

“This is a despicable attack against civilians who were seeking medical care, as well as visiting family members and health workers,” said Staffan de Mistura, the United Nations’ special representative for Afghanistan. “Much of the damage was in the maternity ward of the hospital, and many of those killed and injured were women and children.”

Ashrafi said that half an hour before the attack, his office had received information from Afghan intelligence agencies that a suicide car bomber was going to target the police headquarters. The information gave police time to prepare, Ashrafi said.

“Our police ordered him to stop as he approached within 50 meters of the district entrance gate, but he didn’t stop,” Ashrafi said. “Instead, he turned his car toward the hospital and blew himself up.”

The bombing underscored militants’ willingness to launch devastating attacks on civilian targets, even as Taliban emissaries engage in preliminary peace talks. It comes just days after President Obama, in announcing a planned drawdown of 33,000 U.S. troops by the end of next summer, asserted that the U.S. had begun to reverse the Taliban’s momentum.

A Taliban spokesman told the Associated Press that the insurgency denied responsibility for the attack, though it is common for militant groups to distance themselves from bombings that result in large numbers of civilian deaths.

The number of civilian deaths in the nearly-decade-old Afghan conflict continues to soar. In 2010, more than 2,700 civilians were killed — a 15% increase from the previous year, according to figures compiled by the U.N. Three-fourths of those deaths were caused by insurgents.

alex.rodriguez@latimes.com

Baktash is a special correspondent.