Four dead as Taliban attack intel office

Taliban militants have detonated a car bomb outside an Afghan intelligence office near the capital, killing four soldiers.

The insurgents then tried to attack the compound on foot, with six dying in the assault, officials say.

Separately on Sunday, Afghan officials said that a NATO airstrike had killed 16 people - nine of them civilians, including women and children - in a remote eastern province where the Taliban are strong.

NATO says 10 militants died in the strike, but that it had no reports of any civilian deaths.

Both incidents underscored the chronic insecurity in Afghanistan as US-led foreign forces reduce their presence and hand over more responsibilities to Afghan troops.

Sunday's bombing, for instance, occurred in Maidan Shahr, a city in eastern Wardak province that lies just 40km from Kabul.

Hazrat Janan, a member of the Wardak provincial council says the explosion was powerful enough to shatter windows across a wide stretch of the city.

Attaullah Khogyani, a spokesman for the provincial governor, said the explosion went off around lunch time and and that many of the wounded were Afghan government employees working in nearby offices.

Soldiers guarding the compound managed to kill the militants on foot after the explosion, he said. He said four soldiers and five attackers died, in addition to the car bomber.

Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid claimed responsibility for the attack.

Around 1000 Afghan civilians have been killed and more than 2000 wounded in the first half of this year - a huge portion of them in insurgent attacks - according to the UN.

That marks a 24 per cent increase in casualties compared to the same period last year.