Dozens including children ad women were killed in two suicide attacks that targeted shrines on Ashura processions in Kabul East Afghanistan and in the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif.

At least 58 people including children were killed in two suicide attacks that targeted Ashura processions in shrines Ashura in Kabul East Afghanistan and in the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif .

In Kabul alone 54 people were killed in a suicide attack that targeted a shrine there.

"A suicide bomber detonated his explosives in the Abul Fazil shrine," AFP quoted Kabul police as saying.

The explosion erupted at the entrance to a riverside shrine in central Kabul, where hundreds of people had gathered to mark Ashura.

Separately, four people were killed in Mazar-i-Sharif when another blast struck a shrine in the northern city.

"It was an explosion not a suicide bombing. It was some explosives hidden in a bicycle," AFP quoted a police spokesman for northern Afghanistan as saying, adding that four other people were injured.

For his part, Afghan President Hamid Karzai said that twin bomb attacks were the first "terrorist" acts on an important holy day.
It was "the first time that, on such an important religious day in Afghanistan, terrorism of that horrible nature is taking place," Karzai said at a joint press conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Merkel also expressed her condolences over the attacks, saying they showed "we must continue to work hard in order to be able to ensure security in Afghanistan".