Big suicide bombing in Kabul kills 18 at education center
The death toll from the suicide attack Saturday in
Afghanistan's capital has risen to at least 18 killed and 57 people wounded,
including students, the interior ministry said.
The explosion struck outside an education center in
a heavily Shiite neighborhood of western Kabul, Dasht-e-Barchi.
Interior Ministry spokesman Tariq Arian says that
the attacker was trying to enter the center when he was stopped by security
guards.
According to Arian, the casualty toll may rise
further as family members of victims of the suicide bombing are still searching
the several different hospitals where the wounded have been taken.
No group claimed immediate responsibility for the
bombing. The Taliban rejected any connection with the attack.
An Islamic State affiliate claimed responsibility
for a similar suicide attack at an education center in August 2018, in which 34
students were killed. Within Afghanistan, IS has launched large-scale attacks
on minority Shiites, Sikhs and Hindus, whom it views as apostates.
Hundreds of Sikhs and Hindus in Afghanistan fled the
country in September after a gunman loyal to the militant group killed 25
members of the shrinking community in an attack on their share a place of
worship in Kabul.
The U.S. signed a peace deal with the Taliban in
February, opening up a path toward withdrawing American troops from the
conflict. U.S. officials said the deal would also help refocus security efforts
on fighting the Islamic State, which is a rival of the Taliban in Afghanistan.
There has been an upsurge in violence between
Taliban and Afghan forces in the country recently, even as representatives from
the two warring sides begin their own peace talks in Doha to end the
decades-long war in Afghanistan.
Earlier Saturday a roadside bomb killed nine people
in eastern Afghanistan after it struck a minivan full of civilians, a local
official said.
Ghazni province police spokesman Ahmad Khan Sirat
said that a second roadside bomb killed two policemen, after it struck their
vehicle that was making its way to the victims of the first explosion.
Sirat added that the bombings had wounded several
others, and that the attacks were under investigation.
No one immediately claimed responsibility for the
attacks. The provincial police spokesman claimed the Taliban had placed the
bomb.
