AFGHANISTAN U.S. investigates fatal explosion

An Afghan official said the blast at an old weapons site was an accident.
GHAZNI, Afghanistan (AP) -- The U.S. military was trying to determine today whether an explosion at a weapons cache in Afghanistan that killed seven American soldiers and wounded three was an accident or caused deliberately.
An additional American soldier was missing after the blast on one of the deadliest days for U.S. forces since they deployed here two years ago. An Afghan interpreter also was injured.
The explosion occurred Thursday afternoon as the soldiers worked around the cache in the village of Dehe Hendu, about 90 miles southwest of the capital, Kabul, in Ghazni province.
Lt. Col. Bryan Hilferty, a spokesman at U.S. military headquarters in Kabul, said an investigation was ongoing but provided no details. He said it was unclear whether the blast was an accident.
"There's no indication one way or another," Hilferty said.
Afghan official's statement
However, provincial Gov. Haji Asadullah Khan said the blast was set off by mistake as the U.S. soldiers were trying to defuse arms at an old weapons depot found in an open area.
"I'm sure it wasn't a plot by the Taliban," Khan said. "We know the area, and the people are good."
The deaths come at the end of a bloody month that has underscored the danger and instability still plaguing Afghanistan two years after a U.S.-led invasion ousted the hard-line Islamic Taliban regime for harboring Osama bin Laden and the Al-Qaida network.
This month alone, about 80 people have died in violent incidents in Afghanistan, including civilians, militants, police officers, international peacekeepers and now American soldiers.
Coalition soldiers regularly uncover and destroy caches of weapons, usually dating back to the U.S.-backed mujahedeen resistance against the Soviet occupation in the 1980s. Residents often lead military units to the caches -- a sign, the military says, that it is winning the confidence of Afghans tired after almost a quarter-century of strife.
The wounded soldiers from Thursday's explosion were evacuated to a hospital at Bagram Air Base, the main camp of the U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan. Names of the victims were being withheld until their families could be notified.