A suicide bombing killed at least nine policemen and injured scores of others in Kunduz province of northern Afghanistan on Monday, a health worker and an official said.

The bombing occurred in District 1 in Kunduz city, the provincial capital, at around 8:45 a.m. (0415 GMT), Azizullah Safar, head of the Kunduz hospital, told Xinhua.

Nine dead bodies and 32 injured policemen were brought to the hospital, he said, adding four injured were in critical condition.

The blast occurred when a suicide bomber belting explosives on his body attacked a mass of policemen, who were gathering on an open land to receive training for an upcoming ceremony, Safar said.

Meanwhile, a press officer of the Interior Ministry confirmed with Xinhua anonymously that nine policemen were killed and many others injured in the blast.

Ayub Salangi, police chief of Kunduz province, blamed the enemy of Afghanistan, a phrase used to refer to the Taliban, for the attack.

"We could not immediately identify the attacker, as only his feet were left at the explosion site," he told Xinhua.

This was the deadly suicide attack in the relatively calm northern Afghanistan over the past years.

A Taliban commander recently claimed many suicide bombers had managed to arrive in the northern region to launch attacks.

The blast came one day after a suicide bombing killed three Afghan guards and one driver of a private U.S. security company the USPI in Kandahar province of southern Afghanistan.

The Taliban claimed 2,000 suicide bombers would launch a bloody spring offensive against foreign troops and other targets in this country this year.

Over the past two months, suicide bombings targeting government and foreign interests have happened in Afghanistan nearly on a daily base.

A total of 12 soldiers of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) have been killed in combat in this volatile country since April 8.

Due to rising Taliban-linked insurgency, over 900 persons, mostly Taliban militants, have been killed in Afghanistan this year.

Source: Xinhua