Two Killed in Kazakhstan Suicide Car Blast

A blast tore through a car Tuesday outside a security service building in the capital of Kazakhstan, killing two people in the second such incident in the usually stable Central Asian nation in a week.

Initial reports attributed the blast to a suicide bomber, but the ex-Soviet republic's interior ministry later played down the terror link.

The interior ministry said in a statement that two people died after a "spontaneous explosion" tore through the car.

"These circumstances point to the absence of signs that this was an act of terror," the ministry statement said.

Interior Minister Kalmukhanbet Kasymov later told reporters that "there is no evidence of their involvement in any religious or extremist organizations."

The blast coincided with a visit to Astana by Alexander Lukashenko, the authoritarian president of Belarus who is negotiating an emergency loan for his ex-Soviet state.

The blast went off early Tuesday morning on a square that includes a remand prison operated by the Committe of National Security (KNB), the country's main successor to the communist-era KGB.

But the square also has a train station, and Kazakh state media only referred to that building when telling the nation about the location of the blast.

The police also dismissed initial reports by the private Russian-based Interfax news agency that attributed the incident to a suicide bomber.

The blast came just a week after a suicide bombing outside the headquarters of the security service in the northwestern Kazakh city of Aktobe, which wounded three people including a member of the security services.

Such attacks had until now been rare in Kazakhstan, the most stable and prosperous of the Central Asian republics, whose vast mineral wealth has been overseen since the Soviet era by President Nursultan Nazarbayev.

The veteran leader won an overwhelming re-election last month that was once again criticized by observers from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, which has never recognized a Kazakh election as fair.

Nazarbayev has nevertheless enjoyed broad public support, fostering a business-friendly economic environment and building warm ties with both Russia and China as well as the United States.

The country's parliament, which includes only members of the ruling party, recently passed a draft law allowing Kazakh servicemen to join the international coalition in Afghanistan.

A top U.S. embassy official in Astana said Monday that the move should not directly threaten Kazakh security, but warned of the continuing dangers posed by the Taliban.

"I think that all countries that participate in the anti-terrorist struggle, whether they are directly involved in Afghanistan or not, are at some risk," U.S. Charge d'Affaires John Ordway said in comments released by the embassy.

"And frankly, Kazakhstan and Central Asia face a much bigger threat from the Taliban than even the United States does," he said.