Taliban Roadside Bomb Kills 4 Afghan Family Members

Four members of the same family, including three women, were killed when a Taliban roadside bomb ripped through their vehicle in southern Afghanistan, police said Thursday.

The incident happened overnight in Maruf district of Kandahar province, an insurgent hotbed, as they traveled by tractor, provincial police Chief General Abdul Razaq said.

"They were all members of the same family travelling from one village to another when the explosion hit their vehicle," he said, blaming the Taliban for the bombing.

The militant group's spokesman was unavailable for comment but it frequently plants bombs on dirt roads which are responsible for a large number of civilian deaths.

The U.N. mission in Afghanistan said Saturday that 368 civilians lost their lives in violence across the country during May, making it the deadliest month for Afghan civilians since at least 2007.

The United Nations said 2,777 civilians were killed in the Afghan conflict in 2010, making it the deadliest year since the war started in 2001 when U.S.-led troops brought down the Taliban regime after the September 11 attacks.