Afghan weapons cache kills 7

KABUL, Afghanistan -- An explosion at a weapons cache in Afghanistan killed seven U.S. soldiers and wounded three more Thursday, the U.S. Central Command said. One American soldier was missing.\nAn Afghan interpreter also was wounded by the 3 p.m. explosion near the city of Ghazni, 60 miles southwest of the capital, Kabul. The soldiers were working around a weapons cache when the blast happened, Centcom said in a statement.\nCentcom spokesman Capt. Bruce Frame said the cause had yet to be determined.\nSeparately, investigators sifted through evidence Thursday from suicide bombings that killed British and Canadian soldiers in Kabul the two previous days. The ousted Taliban regime has claimed responsibility for both blasts.\nThe cause of Thursday's weapons cache blast was not immediately known. The wounded soldiers were evacuated to a hospital at Bagram Air Base, headquarters for U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan.\nThe names of the victims were being withheld pending notification of relatives.\nEarlier this month, the U.S. death toll in the two-year war in Afghanistan reached 100. Only 16 Americans died in the lightning war that drove the Taliban from power at the end of 2001 for providing a refuge and base for Osama bin Laden, the suspected mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks. The rest of the Americans died after the Taliban's defeat.\nThe toll includes deaths in other parts of Operation Enduring Freedom, such as a helicopter crash in the Philippines nearly two years ago killing 10 American soldiers.\nThe U.S. provides 9,000 of the 11,000-member coalition troops stationed in Afghanistan.\nTroops at Camp Souter, the British base in eastern Kabul, held a memorial ceremony Thursday for the soldier killed the day before, by a suicide bomber. The victim was identified as Pvt. Jonathan Kitulagoda, 23, from Plymouth in southwest England.\nCommanders and diplomats joined about 150 soldiers to hear readings, prayers and tributes from Kitulagoda's friends in a private gathering, said Capt. Tom Smith, spokesman for the 300-strong British contingent. Kitulagoda's body likely will be flown home next week, he said.