KANDAHAR, Afghanistan — The director of education in Kandahar who was working closely with Canadian development workers to build 50 schools in this war-torn province was among seven civilians killed during a brazen attack Wednesday by five terrorists wearing army uniforms.

Mohammad Anwar Khan died after a suicide bomber smashed the car he was driving through the gates of the provincial council, triggering a massive explosion that shook the walls of the governor's palace about two kilometres away where a meeting was taking place with senior Canadian officials.

That explosion allowed four insurgents including two wearing suicide bomb vests to race into the compound. During the ensuring gunfight with guards both suicide bombers blew themselves, killing themselves and the other two attackers, according to a Canadian army officer who was among the first to arrive on the scene.

"We lost a colleague who was well known to us and highly respected," said Ken Lewis, Canada's top diplomat in Kandahar, who attended a news conference metres from the large crater left by the car bomb, with Gov. Tooryalai Wesa and Brig.-Gen. Jon Vance, who commands the 2,800 Canadian soldiers in the province. "Our CIDA people are pretty shaken up."

Lewis likened the assault by five insurgents to "an attack on Queen's Park," the Ontario legislature in Toronto.

The death toll might have been much higher if the five attackers had struck during a meeting of Afghan elders from across the province of Kandahar that had been scheduled to take place at the time but had been postponed at the last minutes.