KABUL, AFGHANISTAN - Ghulam Haider Hamidi had been warned. Friends and relatives for months urged the mayor of Kandahar to leave his treacherous post and return to his quiet life as an accountant in northern Virginia.
When his son-in-law told him earlier this year he was crazy to stay, Hamidi, 65, recounted a story. He had visited his home village the day before, he said, escorted by U.S. soldiers who were willing to die for Afghanistan. "It would be shameful for me to leave Afghanistan," Hamidi said. It was his duty to stay, he said, no matter what.
On Wednesday morning, a suicide bomber with explosives hidden in his turban killed Hamidi at his downtown office, according to Afghan officials. His death raised to new heights the fear among Kandahar officials and served as another in a quick succession of blows this year to Afghan President Hamid Karzai's grip on southern Afghanistan.
Insurgents in recent months have waged a killing spree in Kandahar. A suicide bomber killed Police Chief Mohammad Mojayed in April. The president's half brother, Ahmed Wali Karzai, a powerful figure in the region, was gunned down in his Kandahar home earlier this month. Days later, Jan Mohammad Khan, a former governor of nearby Uruzgan Province who had become a top presidential adviser, was killed in his Kabul home.
While the killings have not all been proved to be the work of the Taliban, the insurgents have nonetheless profited by taking responsibility and creating the impression that no one who works with the government is safe.
On Wednesday, Taliban spokesman Qari Mohammad Yousuf said the bomber "was one of our mujahedeen and took advantage of today's meeting to kill the mayor. The mayor was under our surveillance, and today was a good opportunity."
At the time of the blast, Hamidi was leaving his office to meet with tribal elders from a neighborhood where two children had been accidentally killed the day before by municipal bulldozers that were razing houses built on government land.
Hamidi has made many enemies in his attempts to boost city tax revenues and reclaim government lands by evicting illegal businesses or destroying the shops.
