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KATHMANDU, Sept 12 (Reuters) - Seven Nepali soldiers and policemen were killed and seven injured in a landmine blast on Thursday in the south of the rebellion-torn Himalayan kingdom, a government official said.

"There were 20 members in the security patrol team. The rest are safe," said Tika Dutta Niraula, senior official in the interior ministry.

He said the blast occurred at at Harnamandi village near Hetauda, 100 km (60 miles) south of Kathmandu.

The explosion comes after Maoist rebels fighting to overthrow the constitutional monarchy killed 109 policemen and soldiers in weekend attacks on two security posts in Nepal.

Nepal's defence ministry said on Thursday 59 more rebel bodies had been recovered from the scene of one battle in the west of the country, taking the number of militants known to have been killed there to 76.

A defence ministry spokesman said some of the 59 bodies found were headless. The guerrillas reportedly chop the heads off bodies to hide the identity of their fallen comrades.

"This (decapitation) indicates that some senior rebel commanders were killed," the spokesman said in a statement.

The rebels, inspired by the revolutionary ideas of the Chinese communist leader Mao Zedong, have stepped up their violent campaign since the state of emergency imposed last November ended on August 28.

More than 3,000 have died since November, when the guerrillas walked out of peace talks.

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