Kabul - Four Afghan civilians working with a construction company were killed in a roadside bomb explosion in eastern Afghanistan, while Afghan and coalition forces killed one insurgent and arrested 18 others, officials said Thursday.

The workers were killed in Yousifkhel district of the south-eastern province of Paktika on Thursday when their vehicle was struck by a roadside bomb, the Interior Ministry said in a statement.

"All the occupants of the vehicle, who were all civilians and working with a road construction company, were martyred in the explosion," it said.

The statement held "the enemies of peace and stability of the country" - a term often used by Afghan officials to describe Taliban militants - responsible for the attack.

Taliban militants, who have waged a bloody insurgency against the Afghan government and the more than 70,000 international forces following their ouster from power in late 2001, rely heavily on use of roadside bombings.

Four US soldiers and four British soldiers were killed in separate roadside attacks in the past two days in southern Afghanistan.

The south and east of the country are the main strongholds for the Taliban inside Afghanistan. The militants often cross the border into those regions from safe havens inside Pakistani tribal areas, according to Afghan and NATO military officials.

Separately, Afghan and US-led coalition forces killed one insurgent and detained ten others in an operation in the eastern province of Nangarhar on Wednesday, the US military said in a statement.

Eight other militants were detained by Afghan army forces on the same day in the Uruzgan and Wardak provinces, the Afghan Defence Ministry said in statement. (dpa)