The World Briefly

January 12, 2023

In Through the Outdoor

Afghanistan

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A suicide blast outside the Afghan foreign ministry in the capital reportedly killed dozens of people Wednesday, the second major attack in Kabul this year, Al Jazeera reported.

Taliban officials said a suicide bomber attempted to enter the ministry but failed. They added that the explosion took place when a Chinese delegation was meeting the Taliban at the government building.

It’s unclear if the delegation was present at the time of the blast, they noted.

The Islamic State’s local affiliate, the Islamic State – Khorasan Province (ISKP), has claimed responsibility for this attack, the Associated Press reported, but Afghan security services have neither denied nor confirmed this claim.

Authorities have also not been clear on the death toll from the blast, with figures ranging from more than five to at least 20 people dead and many injured.

Obaidullah Baheer, a lecturer at the Kabul-based American University of Afghanistan, said that the discrepancies in casualty figures are “troubling,” adding that the Taliban have done this before.

The armed group claims to have improved Afghanistan’s security following their takeover of the Central Asian country in August 2021.

But since then, Afghanistan has been plagued with bomb blasts and attacks, many of them claimed by ISKP.

ISKP has taken responsibility for a number of terrorist attacks, including an attack on Pakistan’s embassy in Kabul last month that Islamabad denounced as an “assassination attempt” against their ambassador.

Hundreds more people, including members of Afghanistan’s minority communities, have been killed or injured in other attacks since the Taliban reclaimed control.

This story originally appeared in the January 12, 2023 newsletter, Power, Corruption and Fireworks.