Image copyright EPA Image caption About 50 people were reportedly injured in the blast at stadium in Lashkar Gah on Friday night

A suspected suicide bomber has killed at least 13 people and injured dozens more in a car bomb attack on a sports stadium in the Afghan province of Helmand.

The blast happened at a wrestling match at the Ghazi Muhammad Ayub Khan stadium in the region's capital Lashkar Gah.

The car was reportedly driven into a crowd outside the stadium.

A police spokesman told AFP that the blast happened by the venue's entrance gate after the match had ended.

Photographs from the scene showed badly damaged cars and thick plumes of smoke rising.

Image copyright Aziz Ahmad Shafee Image caption Officials say the explosion happened as spectators were leaving the stadium

"The bomber wanted to go inside the stadium but he was identified by the police and he detonated himself," Omar Zwak, spokesman for the Helmand provincial governor, told AFP.

Conflicting reports in local media suggest the death toll may be higher than so far confirmed.

The Italian NGO Emergency, which provides medical treatment, said on Twitter it had received at least four of those killed.

Afghanistan has seen a surge in attacks in recent months targeting state security forces and civilians.

The annual spring offensive by Taliban militants is expected to begin in the coming weeks.

On Wednesday a suicide car bomb attack killed 31 people at Nowruz New Year celebrations in Kabul.

The Islamic State (IS) group claimed that bombing, but no-one has so far said they were behind Friday's stadium blast.

Large areas of Helmand province are under Taliban control, but government forces and US airstrikes have prevented Lashkar Gah from falling to the group.

In January, a BBC study found that Taliban fighters were now openly active in 70% of the country.

Last month Afghan President Ashraf Ghani offered them peace talks "without preconditions" - but so far there has been little sign of them taking up the offer.

"The enemies of Afghanistan cannot prevent the celebration of traditional, religious and cultural events in the country," Mr Ghani said on Friday after the suicide attack, local media report.</s>A suspected suicide bomber has killed at least 13 people and injured dozens more in a car bomb attack on a sports stadium in the Afghan province of Helmand.

The blast happened at a wrestling match at the Ghazi Muhammad Ayub Khan stadium in the region's capital Lashkar Gah.

The car was reportedly driven into a crowd outside the stadium.

A police spokesman told AFP that the blast happened by the venue's entrance gate after the match had ended.

The Italian NGO Emergency, which provides medical treatment, said on Twitter it had received at least four of those killed.

No group has so far claimed responsibility for the blast.</s>An official says 12 people have been killed and 40 others wounded in a car bombing outside a sports stadium in Afghanistan’s Helmand province.

Aminullah Abed, the chief of the province’s public health department, said the 12 killed and 40 wounded were received at a hospital in the province’s capital, Lashkar Gah.

Also Read : Kabul University bomb blast; what actually happened?

The explosion occurred after celebrations over the Afghan new year were winding down and revelers were on their way home, he added.</s>A car bombing outside a sports stadium in Afghanistan's southern Helmand province on Friday killed 13 people and wounded 40 others, an official said.

Aminullah Abed, the chief of the province's public health department, said the casualties were received at a hospital in the province's capital, Lashkar Gah, with many of the wounded burnt beyond recognition.

The explosion occurred after Afghan new year celebrations were winding down and revelers were on their way home, he added.

Omar Zwak, spokesman for the provincial governor, said 14 people were killed and 45 others wounded.

Provincial chief of police Abdul Ghafar Safi said the blast was carried out by a suicide bomber and that the target was civilians. No high ranking officials were present or harmed at the stadium, he added.

The office of Afghan president Ashraf Ghani issued a statement condemning the "brutal terrorist attack."</s>A car packed with explosives blew up outside a sports stadium in Afghanistan's restive south on Friday, killing at least 13 people and wounding dozens more, officials said, capping a bloody week in the war-torn country.

The suicide attack happened in Lashkar Gah, the capital of opium poppy-rich Helmand province, as spectators were leaving a wrestling match at the stadium, provincial governor spokesman Omar Zwak told AFP.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack, which Zwak said killed at least 13 people and wounded 45 others, including children.

Helmand police spokesman Salam Afghan had earlier given a lower toll of 10 dead and 35 wounded.

Afghan officials often give conflicting figures in the wake of attacks.

"The suicide bomber detonated his car bomb as spectators were leaving the stadium," Zwak said.

"The bomber wanted to go inside the stadium but he was identified by the police and he detonated himself."

Local officials were at the match, which witnesses said had been held as part of celebrations for Nawrooz, the Persian new year holiday that some fundamentalist Muslims consider un-Islamic.

Agha Mohammad, a 25-year-old shopkeeper from Lashkar Gah, was among the spectators leaving the stadium when the blast happened.

"Four of my family members were martyred and three others were wounded," a sobbing Mohammad told AFP at the hospital run by the Italian NGO Emergency.

Photos posted on Twitter purportedly of the explosion showed a huge fire and a thick plume of black smoke rising into the sky.

"We heard a loud explosion from our surgical centre in the city, Emergency tweeted.

"35 wounded already taken to our hospital, another 4 were dead on arrival."

President Ashraf Ghani, whose government has been lambasted for its inability to protect ordinary Afghans, condemned the attack against "innocent people", according to a statement.

Helmand is largely controlled by the Taliban, which is under growing pressure to take up Ghani's offer of peace talks to end the 16-year war.

So far the Taliban, Afghanistan's largest militant group, has given only a muted response.

The attack caps a bloody few days in Afghanistan as Taliban and Islamic State militants ramp up attacks even before the official start of the spring fighting season.

In Kabul on Wednesday a suicide bomber blew himself up among a crowd of people celebrating Nawrooz, killing dozens of people, many of them teenagers.

IS's local franchise in Afghanistan claimed responsibility for the assault in the heavily Shiite neighbourhood -- the fifth suicide bombing in the Afghan capital in recent weeks -- via the messaging app Telegram.

The blast killed 33 and wounded 65, the health ministry said, up from an earlier toll given by the interior ministry of 26 dead and 18 hurt.

All the injured were civilians, said interior ministry spokesman Nasrat Rahimi.

Despite calls for the Taliban to sit down with the Afghan government, the group -- which has been resurgent since the withdrawal of US-led NATO combat troops at the end of 2014 -- appears to have few reasons to negotiate.

In October, insurgents controlled or influenced nearly half of Afghanistan's districts -- double the percentage in 2015, the US government's office of the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction said in January.

Over the same period, the watchdog said, the number of districts under Afghan government control or influence fell to its lowest level since December 2015.</s>A car bombing outside a sports stadium in Afghanistan’s southern Helmand province on Friday killed 13 people and wounded 40 others, an official said.

Aminullah Abed, the chief of the province’s public health department, said the casualties were received at a hospital in the province’s capital, Lashkar Gah, with six of the wounded in critical condition and many others burnt beyond recognition.

The explosion occurred after Afghan new year celebrations were winding down and revelers were on their way home, he added.

Omar Zwak, spokesman for the provincial governor, said 14 people were killed and 45 others wounded.

Provincial chief of police Abdul Ghafar Safi said the blast was carried out by a suicide bomber and that the target was civilians. No high ranking officials were present or harmed at the stadium, he added.

The office of Afghan president Ashraf Ghani issued a statement condemning the “brutal terrorist attack.”

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack.

Both the Taliban and the Islamic State group, whose affiliate in Afghanistan has grown stronger since it emerged in 2014, have stepped up attacks recently, in what analysts say is a campaign of violence intended to undermine the U.S.-backed government.

On Jan. 27, a Taliban attacker drove an ambulance filled with explosives into the heart of the city, killing at least 103 people and wounding as many as 235.

The Taliban claimed the ambulance attack, as well as an attack a week earlier in which militants stormed a luxury hotel in Kabul, killing 22 people, including 14 foreigners, and setting off a 13-hour battle with security forces.

The recent attacks have underscored the weaknesses of Afghan security forces more than 16 years after the U.S.-led invasion toppled the Taliban.

They also raise questions about President Donald Trump’s strategy for winning America’s longest war, which was announced in August but has changed little on the ground. That strategy was based on ramping up military pressure on the Taliban to eventually force them into peace talks with the government.</s>The incident took place outside a sports stadium in Lashkar Gah, the capital of Helmand province. A wresting match was taking place inside the stadium at the time of the attack.

The victims were all civilians, according to Helmand provincial spokesman Omar Zwak.

Emergency, an Italian humanitarian organization that operates a surgical center in Lashkar Gah, received several of the victims.

"We heard a loud explosion from our Surgical Centre in the city. 35 wounded already taken to our hospital, another 4 were dead on arrival," the NGO stated on Twitter.

#Lashkargah We heard a loud explosion from our Surgical Centre in the city. 35 wounded already taken to our hospital, another 4 were dead on arrival. #Helmand #Afghanistan — EMERGENCY (@emergency_ong) March 23, 2018 The bombing comes just days after a suicide bomber killed 29 people in Afghanistan's capital city of Kabul, which has suffered a series of deadly attacks since the start of the year. Blast kills 29 near Sakhi shrine in Kabul, Afghan officials say Friday's attack was quickly condemned by the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan "Attacks directed at civilians are clear violations of international humanitarian law and may amount to war crimes," UNAMA tweeted. There has so far been no claim of responsibility for the explosion.</s>KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — An official says 12 people have been killed and 40 others wounded in a car bombing outside a sports stadium in Afghanistan's Helmand province.

Aminullah Abed, the chief of the province's public health department, said the 12 killed and 40 wounded were received at a hospital in the province's capital, Lashkar Gah, on Friday.

The explosion occurred after celebrations over the Afghan new year were winding down and revelers were on their way home, he added.

Copyright 2017 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
A car bomb is driven into a crowd outside the Ghazi Muhammad Ayub Khan Stadium in Lashkar Gah, Helmund, before detonating. At least 13 people are killed.