At least 17 people died Thursday in a car bomb blast in an Afghan city as a crowd shopped for the Muslim Eid al-Adha festival, officials and a doctor said.
“Seventeen bodies and 21 wounded were taken to our hospital,” Sediqullah, a senior doctor at a hospital in the city of Puli Alam in Logar province, told the AFP news agency.
The bombing came hours before a three-day ceasefire began in the country for the Muslim Eid al-Adha festival, authorities said.
“It was a suicide car bomb in a crowded place where our people were buying from Eid al-Adha,” Dedar Lawang, a spokesman for the governor of Logar, told AFP.
The ceasefire, announced by the Taliban, comes at a time when violence has escalated across the war-torn country as peace talks negotiated by the United States between the armed group and a government-mandated committee Afghan await completion of prisoner exchange between the two sides. .
The Taliban denied responsibility for the attack in a statement by spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid.
The blast struck Afghan security forces in Pul-e-Alan, the capital of eastern Logar province, and civilian victims are also feared, according to Shahpoor Ahmadzai, a spokesman for the provincial police.
He added that it was not clear if it was a car or a suicide bombing, but that security forces had gathered to serve in the city to prepare for security measures for Eid al-Adha, to be held in Afghanistan on Friday.
Since the agreement between the United States and the Taliban in February, 3,560 people from the Afghan security forces have been killed in attacks by fighters, according to Afghan President Ashraf Ghani.
The UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan said in a report this week that more than 1,280 Afghan civilians had been killed in the first six months of the year, mainly as a result of clashes between Afghan government forces and the Taliban.
The United States Special Representative for Afghanistan, Zalmay Khalilzad, was in Kabul on Wednesday to discuss the need to keep violence everywhere after the ceasefire and the completion of the prisoner exchange, according to a statement from the United States embassy. in Kabul.
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