Bombs in Afghan capital kill at least 10, wound 12 (Gallery)
Three bombs exploded in Kabul, Afghanistan, killing 10 and injuring 12.
Afghan security personnel inspect the site of the explosion on June 1, 2021.
June 1, 2021
KABUL, Afghanistan — Three bombs rattled the Afghan capital Kabul late Tuesday, killing at least 10 people and plunging the city into darkness.
Two bombs exploded in quick succession in separate locations of a west Kabul neighborhood, killing at least 10 and wounding a dozen others, said deputy Interior Ministry spokesman Said Hamid Rushan. Those bombings both targeted minivans and happened in a mostly ethnic Hazara area of the capital, Rushan added.
The first exploded near the home of a prominent Hazara leader, Mohammad Mohaqiq, and in front of a Shiite mosque, the religion of most Hazaras. The second bomb also targeted a minivan, but Rushan said details were still being collected.
A third bomb heavily damaged an electrical grid station in north Kabul, said Sangar Niazai, a spokesman for the government power supply department.
No one claimed responsibility for the bombings, but the Islamic State group affiliate operating in Afghanistan has previously declared war on minority Shiites, who make up roughly 20% of the majority Sunni Muslim nation of 36 million people.
The IS affiliate previously took responsibility for several attacks in May on Afghanistan’s power supply stations in Kabul and in several other provinces.
On May 8, a car bomb and two roadside bombs exploded outside the Syed-al-Shahada girls school, also in a predominantly Hazara neighborhood, killing nearly 90 people, many of them students. No one has claimed that attack yet, but the U.S. blamed IS.
The attacks come as the United States withdraws the last of its 2,500-3,500 troops along with 7,000 allied NATO forces. The last soldiers are to be gone by Sept. 11 at the latest, generating fears of increased chaos in an already deeply insecure country.
Violence has escalated in Afghanistan even as the U.S. struck a peace deal with the Taliban in February 2020 under the Trump administration.
The agreement called for the last of the U.S. and NATO troops to be out of the country by May 1. Instead, the withdrawal began May 1 after President Joe Biden announced in mid-April America was ending its “forever war.” At the time, Biden declared terrorist groups like al-Qaida and the Islamic State had been sufficiently degraded and it was no longer necessary to keep thousands of troops deployed to Afghanistan.
Stalled peace talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban are set to resume in Qatar, said a member of the Afghan government negotiation team, Nader Nadery.
“I do not see any sign yet of meaningful talks from the Taliban on key issues to end this senseless war,” Nadery said.
