Seven kids among 14 dead in Afghan bombing

At least 14 people, including seven children, were killed Thursday when an IED went off in a graveyard in the eastern Afghan province of Nangarhar, a government spokesman said.

"A group of people were visiting a cemetery to pay tribute to a deceased relative in Gulahee village of Ghani Khil district at around 8 a.m. but an IED was detonated, killing seven innocent women and seven children," reported Xinhua citing spokesman Ahmad Zia Abdulzai.

He said three women and a child were also wounded in the explosion, which took place at the first day of Eid-ul-Fitr.

"It is not known yet, if the IED was detonated deliberately or one of the victims step on a pressure plate device fixed by the militants to initiate the blast," Abdulzai said.

A total of 1,319 civilians were killed and 2,533 injured in conflict-related violence in the first half of the year in Afghanistan, according to a UN report issued July 31 in Kabul.

The UN report attributed 74 percent of the civilian deaths to the attacks of Taliban insurgents and other armed groups opposing the Afghan government.