The terror threat is ever present in Afghanistan

The explosion in Baghrami district, about 15 kilometres (nine miles) south of the Afghan capital, was the first direct attack on forces of the International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan (Isaf).

A spokesman for Isaf, Lieutenant-Colonel Thomas Lobbering, dismissed suggestions of any link between the incident and a possible war on Iraq.

But he confirmed that the device had been deliberately detonated on the roadside as an Isaf vehicle was passing.

Lieutenant-Colonel Lobbering said that patrols would be stepped up, not scaled down, as a result of the incident.

Warning

The blast hit the Isaf vehicle as it was moving in a convoy along a main road, and the back of the vehicle took the brunt.

The local interpreter and the wounded soldier were airlifted to a field hospital for treatment but the interpreter died two hours later.

No-one has claimed responsibility for the attack which the Isaf said was made with an improvised explosive device.

Nearly 5,000 Isaf troops are stationed in Kabul to patrol the war-shattered city and its environs and about 700 are Dutch. The Netherlands and Germany recently took joint command from Turkey as part of a rotation.

The injured man is a 23-year-old corporal with the 11th Air Mobile Brigade, Isaf said.

Isaf's German commander, Lieutenant General Norbert van Heyst, warned earlier this week that Islamic extremists might launch attacks on Isaf if the United States attacked Iraq.