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Kabul, afghanistan
Islamic State militants in Afghanistan stormed Kabul University on Monday, which hosted a book fair attended by the Iranian ambassador, sparking an hours-long shooting and leaving at least 22 dead and 22 wounded at the largest school. of the country devastated by war.
Most of the victims were students and it was feared that the death toll would rise further and some of the injured were said to be in critical condition.
It was the second attack on an educational institution in Kabul in as many weeks.
The Taliban quickly issued a statement denying any involvement in the assault, which occurred as insurgents continue peace talks with representatives of the US-backed Kabul government, with the aim of helping the US finally withdraw from Afghanistan. Later that day, the Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the attack.
As the attack unfolded, students and teachers were seen fleeing the part of the campus where the law and journalism schools are located, while hand grenades exploded and shots were heard from automatic rifles. Dozens of Afghan special forces surrounded the campus, guiding teachers and students to safety.
The chaos lessened as the sun set over the Afghan capital and Interior Ministry spokesman Tariq Arian said all three attackers involved in the assault were killed.
The Islamic State group said it was targeting “newly graduated judges and investigators from the apostate Afghan government” gathered on campus, according to the SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors online messages from terrorist groups.
The statement claimed that only two of its fighters were involved and they released their photographs, contradicting the Afghan authorities’ report on three attackers. The claim did not indicate that the Islamic State group intended to target the Iranian envoy or the book fair specifically.
Last week, the Islamic State group also claimed responsibility for a brutal assault on a tutoring center in Dasht-e-Barchi, the mostly Shiite neighborhood of the Afghan capital, which killed at least 24 students and injured more than 100.
The peace negotiations between the Taliban and the Kabul government, known as intra-Afghan talks, were part of an agreement Washington signed with insurgents in February. They take place in the state of Qatar, on the Persian Gulf, and are seen as Afghanistan’s best chance for peace, though the daily bloodshed has continued.
Five hours after Monday’s fighting, sporadic grenade explosions and shots from automatic weapons still echoed in the empty streets surrounding the university’s fenced campus. Afghan troops stood guard.
Ahmad Samim, a university student, told reporters that he saw militants armed with pistols and Kalashnikov assault rifles firing at the school, the oldest in the country with some 17,000 students. He said the attack happened on the east side of the university, where they teach their law and journalism schools.
Afghan media reported that a book exhibition was taking place at the university, which was attended by several dignitaries at the time of the shooting. None of the dignitaries was injured.
While Afghan officials declined to discuss the book fair, Iran’s semi-official ISNA news agency reported on Sunday that Iranian ambassador Bahador Aminian and cultural attache Mojtaba Noroozi were opening the fair, which hosted some 40 Iranian publishers. .
Iranian state television reported that the attack occurred but did not offer information about its officials.
Iranian diplomats have previously come under fire in Afghanistan, in incidents that dangerously increased tensions between the two countries. In 1998, Iran held the Taliban responsible for the deaths of nine Iranian diplomats working at its consulate in northern Afghanistan and sent reinforcements to the 980-kilometer-long Iran-Afghanistan border.
The Islamic State group’s affiliate in Afghanistan has declared war on the country’s Shiite Muslim minority and carried out dozens of attacks since it emerged in the region in 2014. A horrific attack earlier this year at a Kabul maternity hospital, also in the Dasht-e-Barchi neighborhood – the Islamic State group was blamed. In that attack, militants killed 25 people, many of them newborns and mothers.
Schools have also been targeted in the past. Last year, a bomb outside the gates of Kabul University killed eight people. In 2016, gunmen attacked the American University in Kabul, killing 13.
The violence has been relentless even as talks in Qatar to end more than four decades of war in Afghanistan have been painfully slow and despite repeated demands for a reduction in violence.
The agreement between the United States and the Taliban in February allowed the withdrawal of US and NATO troops from Afghanistan and laid the groundwork for the ongoing talks in Doha.
The architect of Washington’s deal with the Taliban, Zalmay Khalilzad, returned to the region last week, citing deep disappointment at the escalation of violence in Afghanistan. On Monday, Khalilzad was in neighboring Pakistan, where he met with the powerful army chief. Few details of the meeting have been released, but it is widely believed that Khalilzad was pushing for Pakistan to help pressure the Taliban to agree to a reduction in violence.
Although its political office is based in Qatar, the Taliban’s leadership councils are located in Pakistan, and Islamabad is instrumental in pressuring insurgents to enter into peace talks.
Although Khalilzad and the Afghan government have been calling for a ceasefire or at least a reduction in violence, the Taliban have refused a truce, saying that a permanent end to the fighting would be part of the negotiations.
Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry condemned Monday’s attack in Kabul, calling it an “act of terrorism” that was particularly “despicable because it was aimed at a learning institution.” Last week, a suicide bomber attacked a religious school in northwestern Pakistan on the border with Afghanistan, killing eight students and wounding more than 120.
Also on Monday, a vehicle collided with a roadside mine in southern Afghanistan’s Helmand province, killing at least seven civilians, most of them women and children, said the provincial governor’s spokesman Omer Zwak. .
This story was reported by The Associated Press. AP writers Nasser Karimi and Amir Vahdat in Tehran, Iran, contributed to this report.
