Afghan children set off unexploded mortar round, 3 dead

Kabul: A group of children set off an unexploded mortar round in a residential area in eastern Afghanistan on Sunday, causing a blast that killed a woman and two children, according to provincial official.

Attahullah Khogyani, spokesman for the governor of Nangarhar province, said another seven children were wounded in Sunday’s explosion. He said the mortar round had been fired by insurgents the night before but failed to explode.

Afghanistan is littered with land mines and unexploded munitions left over from decades of war, which kill and wound hundreds of people every year.

In Jalalabad, the capital of Nangarhar, a rickshaw loaded with explosives blew up near a mosque and registration center, wounding a policeman and six civilians, Khogyani said. No one immediately claimed the blast.

Both the Taliban and an Islamic State affiliate are active in Nangarhar.

The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for a bombing in Jalalabad on Saturday that wounded 12 people, including two traffic police.