A huge bomb exploded near heavily guarded embassies and military bases in the Afghan capital on Wednesday, killing at least 80 people and wounding more than 300 others, many as they headed to work on foot or in buses, the interior ministry and witnesses said, the WSJ reported.
The death toll from the attack is expected to rise as more bodies are discovered in the debris. The explosion happened at around 8:30 a.m. local time in the Wazir Akbar Khan area, a busy neighborhood that’s home to many foreign embassies and the presidential palace, Interior Ministry spokesman Najib Danish told Bloomberg. Women and children were among the dead and wounded.
According to Reuters, the bomb, one of the deadliest in Kabul and coming at the start of the holy month of Ramadan, exploded close to the fortified entrance to the German embassy, wounding some staff, German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel said. He said that one Afghan security guard was killed and others were likely among the dead. "Such attacks do not change our resolve in continuing to support the Afghan government in the stabilization of the country," he said.
Basir Mujahid, a spokesman for city police, said the explosives were hidden in a sewage truck. He suggested that the German embassy might not have been the target of the blast, which sent clouds of black smoke into the sky near the presidential palace.
The Taliban, the biggest insurgent group in the country, denied responsibility for the attack, which occurred shortly after the White House and Pentagon announced that they are considering sending an additional 3,000 special forces “advisors” to the country, WSJ added. The Islamic State hasn’t taken responsibility either. Terrorist violence in Afghanistan and Iraq is expected to increase in the coming weeks as ISIS has called for an escalation of strikes to coincide with the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, WSJ reported.
The attack was the largest in the Afghan capital since March, when ISIS fighters disguised as doctors broke into a military hospital and massacred scores of people, WSJ reported. The death toll from that attack hasn’t been officially reported, but it’s rumored to have exceeded 100 people. It also comes less than a week after ISIS fighters murdered nearly two dozen Coptic Christians in Egypt, many of whom were children, according to local officials.
Afghan Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah called for Afghan and US forces to retaliate against the group that carried out the attack, saying it must be “destroyed and uprooted,” according to Bloomberg.
“We want peace but those who kill us in the holy month of Ramadan don’t,” Abdullah Abdullah, Afghanistan’s chief executive who shares power with President Ashraf Ghani, said in posts on Twitter. They must “be destroyed and uprooted.”
Here’s a roundup of eyewitness accounts as reported by WSJ:
Wednesday’s blast rocked the capital, sending a mushroom cloud high above the city.
“I was in the makeup room preparing for my morning show. A huge boom shook the room and everything collapsed. It was terrible,” said Taban Ibraz, a presenter for Afghan television network 1TV, located near the blast.
“The entire studio, newsroom and offices have been destroyed.”
An employee of Roshan, a mobile phone company, said many of his colleagues were killed and wounded in the blast.
“The two floors of office building collapsed completely as a result of the explosion,” he said. “Then office’s generators caught fire as well.”
The explosion struck near the entrance of the so-called Green Zone, which encompasses the U.S. military headquarters and the American embassy here.
It also hit near the Germany embassy, where an Afghan guard was killed and German staff were injured, German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel said in Berlin.
A driver employed by the BBC was killed during the attack; four BBC reporters were also injured, as the news agency confirmed via twitter.
BBC statement: pic.twitter.com/FBl4IRi16E
— BBC News Press Team (@BBCNewsPR) May 31, 2017
At the Wazir Akbar Khan hospital a few blocks away, there were scenes of chaos as ambulances brought in wounded. Frantic relatives scanned casualty lists and questioned hospital staff for news. "It felt like an earthquake," said 21-year-old Mohammad Hassan, describing the moment the blast struck the bank where he was working. His head wound had been bandaged but blood still soaked his white dress shirt.
Another lightly wounded victim, Nabib Ahmad, 27, said there was widespread destruction and confusion. "I couldn"t think clearly, there was a mess everywhere," he said.
India and Pakistan promptly condemned the blast. "India stands with Afghanistan in fighting all types of terrorism. Forces supporting terrorism need to be defeated," Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in a tweet. India said its embassy staff were safe.
Donald Trump is due to decide soon on a recommendation to send 3,000 to 5,000 more troops to bolster the small NATO training force and U.S. counter-terrorism mission now totalling just over 10,000. The commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, General John Nicholson, told a congressional hearing this year that he needed several thousand more troops to help Afghan forces break a "stalemate" with the Taliban.
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