2 Afghan mosques bombed: 72 dead, 41 hurt
IS claims responsibility
KABUL (Reuters) — At least 72 people including children were killed while 41 others were wounded when suicide bombers attacked two mosques in Afghanistan on Friday, officials and witnesses said.
One bomber walked into a Shi’ite Muslim mosque here in the capital as people were praying on Friday night and detonated an explosive, one of the worshippers there, Mahmood Shah Husaini, said.
At least 39 people died in the blast at the Imam Zaman mosque in the city’s western Dasht-e-Barchi district, interior ministry spokesman Najib Danish said.
The Islamic State has claimed responsibility for the attack. In a statement on its website late Friday, the IS claimed its fighter Abu Ammar al-Turkmani “detonated his explosive vest among the apostates,” but the group did not provide evidence to support its claim.
Shi’ite Muslims have suffered a series of attacks in Afghanistan in recent months, many of them claimed by the Sunni Muslim militants of IS.
A separate suicide bombing killed at least 33 people also at a mosque in central Ghor province, a police spokesman said.
The attack appeared to target a local leader from the Jamiat political party, according to a statement from Balkh provincial governor Atta Mohammad Noor, a leading figure in Jamiat.
No one immediately claimed responsibility.
Funerals were scheduled yesterday in several cemeteries in western Kabul.
Egypt gun battle: 52 killed
Meanwhile, at least 52 Egyptian police and conscripts were killed and six more were wounded in a gun battle on Friday during a raid in a suspected militant hideout in the western desert, according to three security sources.
Egypt is battling an Islamist insurgency concentrated in the Sinai peninsula from two main groups including an IS affiliate that has killed hundreds of security forces since 2013.
Authorities were following a lead to a militant camp in the desert where eight suspected members of Hasm Movement were believed to be hiding, security sources said.
The group has claimed attacks around Cairo targeting judges and police.