Taliban insurgents who vowed to derail the upcoming Afghan legislative polls killed a parliamentary candidate along with his six bodyguards in the restive Uruzgan province Friday, a private news agency reported Sunday.

"Taliban fighters attacked and killed Engineer Fidai and his six bodyguards in Gizab district of Uruzgan province on Friday around 9 o'clock," Hindokosh quoted Taliban's spokesman Mullah Abdul Latif Hakimi as saying.

Fidai was the second parliamentary candidate killed by Taliban militias over the past week.

However, no official in the Afghan Election Commission was immediately available to make comment on the subject.

Remnants of the fundamentalist movement whose regime was unseated by US military three and half years ago have intensified their activities since early spring, during which more than 400 including rebels, Afghan and US troops as well as civilians were killed.

Source: Xinhua