Deputy chairman of Tajikistan's border protection committee Sabza Sarkorov said the incident happened yesterday when the two guards stepped on a landmine planted there sometime during Tajikistan's civil war in 1992-1997. The Islamic opposition that fought during that war had bases in northern Afghanistan.

Earlier this year, Tajik border guards took over the watch along the Afghan frontier from Russian border guards who had been providing security since Tajikistan became independent in 1991.

Thousand of landmines from the civil war-era are still claiming lives in the border region every year.

(AP)