- At least 19 people died and another 30 were injured this Friday after a suicide attack inside an educational center in western Kabul, where mainly members of the attacked Shiite Hazara minorities reside.
“There was a suicide attack against the Kaj educational center, in which 19 people died and another 27 were injured,” the spokesman for the capital’s Police, Khalid Zadran, told Efe.
The explosion took place inside one of the classrooms during a practice exam to prepare for university entrance exams, when the educational center was overcrowded with students, Zadran added.
“We usually ask schools to inform the security forces of the police districts before carrying out these special programs,” he said.
Malavi Shamsullah, the chief of the Police of District 13 of the Afghan capital, where the event took place, told Efe that the number of injured was “30 or 40.”
The Kabul attack has not yet been claimed
The attack, which took place this morning in the Hazara neighborhood of Dasht-e-Barchi, has not yet been claimed by any terrorist formation or group.
The jihadist group Islamic State (IS) has in the past claimed numerous attacks in Afghanistan against this minority, which it considers apostate.
At least five people were injured, on September 10, in two explosions in Dasht-e-Barchi, while the IS claimed responsibility last April for an attack with explosives in a Shiite mosque in which twelve people died and another 34 were injured. in full Ramadan.
The attacks against students of the minimum Hazara have been repeated during the last years in Afghanistan. The last one, also last April, caused at least 6 deaths and 25 injuries, although the Taliban’s control of the information prevented obtaining a clear figure, with some witnesses raising the victims.
In May 2021, an attack on a girls’ school in the Dashte Barchi neighborhood left 110 dead, mostly girls, and 290 injured. Months before, another attack in October 2020 against an educational center of this minimum, causing 24 deaths and 57 injuries.
Since coming to power in August 2021, the Taliban have launched several operations against IS in various parts of the country, eager to show that their return would of course also bring an end to the violence.
The guarantee of security and control of jihadism was one of the great during the movements of the Taliban in the territories under their control, the war with the deposed government and international forces.