Kabul: At least 36 people died and 64 were wounded when five car bombs detonated simultaneously in Afghanistan's southern city of Kandahar on Tuesday, officials said.
The blast appeared to target a Japanese construction company that mostly employs Pakistani engineers, according to officials.
They said the construction company's office was destroyed and dozens of nearby buildings were damaged.
An AP reporter at the scene described the blast as the largest he has heard after almost eight years of living in Kandahar, the site of several large Taliban attacks in recent years.
So many houses and nearby buildings had collapsed that officials feared the death toll could rise further.
The AP reporter at the scene estimated that 40 shops had been destroyed.
Five vehicles filled with explosives detonated together, causing the massive blast, said a provincial council member.
Taliban militants have carried out several complex attacks in Kandahar the last several year. Kandahar is the spiritual home of the Taliban.
A large NATO base sits on Kandahar's outskirts, but militants control districts immediately to the city's west.
In other violence, a bomb blast killed four US troops in southern Afghanistan on Tuesday, said a US military spokeswoman.
No other information was released pending the notification of family members.
The deaths bring to 41 the number of US troops killed in Afghanistan this month, the second deadliest month in the country since the 2001 US invasion.
Last month a record 44 US troops died.
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