Kabul --

- Two Afghan civilians were killed and nearly 80 NATO troops were wounded after a truck packed with explosives hidden under firewood rammed into the entrance of a military base in eastern Afghanistan, military officials said Sunday.

The Taliban asserted responsibility for the attack. In a statement on the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the United States, the radical Islamic movement, which gave shelter to Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda when it ruled Afghanistan, said Afghans became the biggest victims of the response to the strikes.

"It will remain a permanent stigma on the face of Western democracy that America and her allies martyred tens of thousands of Muslims under the pretext of this ambiguous and murky event," the statement said.

The bombing in Wardak province occurred Saturday night amid heightened alert in Afghanistan over the possibility that extremists would use the anniversary to launch attacks.

NATO said in a statement Sunday that the explosion damaged the perimeter wall ringing the base and a maintenance facility, but protective barriers "absorbed most of the explosion." NATO officials said 25 Afghans and 77 international troops had been treated for "non-life threatening injuries." U.S. troops control the base.

Thirty NATO troops were killed in the same province last month when a Chinook transport helicopter they were traveling in was shot down with a rocket-propelled grenade.

Meanwhile, the U.S. Embassy in Kabul held a commemoration ceremony early Sunday for the victims of the Sept. 11 attacks.

"What happened here in Afghanistan and in the United States 10 years ago has joined our two nations forever in a common cause," Ambassador Ryan Crocker told attendees, according to a summary of his remarks provided by the embassy. "Afghan soil must never again be used by elements that would use terror to attack the people of America, Afghanistan and the international community."

The United States and its allies invaded Afghanistan on Oct. 7, 2001, after the Taliban, who then ruled the country, refused to hand over bin Laden.

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