| Afghan soldiers remove the wreckage of damaged tankers from the explosion site in Kandahar |
Suspected Taleban rebels set off a bomb that destroyed five oil tankers carrying fuel for a U.S. military base in southern Afghanistan.
Local officials say the pre-dawn attack Sunday blew up one of the trucks parked outside Kandahar airbase, and set off a chain of explosions that destroyed four other tankers. Three truck drivers were critically injured in the incident.
The attack comes a day after the top U.S. commander in the country, Lieutenant General David Barno, predicted the Taleban militia would collapse within the next 12 months.
He warned, however, that remaining militants financed and trained by al-Qaida allies may try to compensate by staging a "high profile attack" before the country's first post-Taleban parliamentary elections.
Some information for this report provided by AP and Reuters.
