[] [BTBBT Daily -12/7]Suicide bomber targets worshippers in Kabul

--> A SUICIDE attack killed dozens of Shiite Muslims at a crowded Kabul shrine yesterday and four died in a smaller blast in a key northern city in the worst sectarian violence Afghanistan has seen since the fall of the Taliban.

The Kabul bomb was the deadliest in the Afghan capital since 2008, and punctured any lingering sense of optimism from a conference on Monday where Western allies made firm but not specific promises to support Afghanistan after troops leave in 2014.

Bodies and blood were scattered down a street in the heart of old Kabul where a crowd of hundreds had gathered to mark the festival of Ashura with chanting and self-flagellation.

At least 55 were killed and 160 wounded, some critically.

Afghans, who have previously been spared the large-scale sectarian attacks that regularly trouble Iraq and neighboring Pakistan, now face the grim prospect of a new type of bloodshed being added to the dangers of daily life.

"This is the first time on such an important religious day in Afghanistan that terrorism of that horrible nature is taking place," Afghan President Hamid Karzai told journalists in Germany, where the conference on Afghanistan's future was held.

Outside a Kabul hospital, mourners cried near a pile of bloody clothes and shoes. A woman in a dark headscarf clutching a bloodstained sports shoe said her son, in his early 20s, had died.

No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attacks in Kabul and northern Mazar-i-Sharif.

Afghanistan has a history of tension and violence between Sunnis and the Shiite minority, who make up around 15 percent of the population.

"Afghanistan has been at war for 30 years and terrible things have happened, but one of the things that Afghans have been spared generally has been what appears to be this kind of very targeted sectarian attack," said Kate Clark, from the Afghanistan Analysts Network.

"We don't know who planted the bomb yet and it is dangerous to jump to conclusions but if it was Taliban, it marks something really serious, and dangerous, and very troubling."

Shortly after the Kabul blast, a bicycle bomb exploded near the main mosque in Mazar-i-Sharif, killing four people, injuring 17 and sparking a fight at a university mosque where Shiites and Sunnis were both praying.

"Enemies wanted to target Muslims attending prayer, but because of tight security they failed," a police spokesman said.

Four people were hurt in the mosque scuffle, which broke out when worshippers were arguing about the blast.

Police later defused a mine, found near the site of the explosion and likely intended to target rescuers and security forces attending to victims.

A motorbike bomb also appeared to be aimed at Shiite worshippers in southern Kandahar city, the Taliban's spiritual home.

It exploded prematurely, injuring two policemen and three civilians.