Massive truck bomb kills 80 in Kabul blast
Hundreds wounded in diplomatic area attack
AT least 80 people were killed and hundreds wounded when a massive truck bomb ripped through Kabul’s diplomatic quarter yesterday, bringing carnage to the streets of the Afghan capital just days into the Muslim holy fasting month of Ramadan. Bodies littered the scene and a towering plume of smoke rose from the highly-fortified area, which houses foreign embassies, after the powerful blast in the morning rush hour shattered the windows of missions and residences.
A Western diplomatic source said the vehicle was a water tanker stuffed with more than 1 500kg of explosives which left a 7m deep crater at the scene.
Rescue workers were digging bodies from the rubble hours after the explosion. Dozens of damaged cars choked the roads as wounded survivors and panicked schoolgirls sought safety.
Men and women struggled to get through security checkpoints to search for loved ones.
It was not clear what the target was, but the attack underscores spiralling insecurity in Afghanistan, where a military beset by soaring casualties and desertions is struggling to beat back insurgents.
“Unfortunately the toll has reached 80 martyred [killed] and over 300 wounded, including many women and children,” health ministry spokesman Waheed Majroh said.
He said the figures would continue to climb as more bodies were pulled from the debris.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack, slammed by President Ashraf Ghani as a war crime.
The Taliban tweeted that they were not involved and strongly condemned the blast, but the insurgent group rarely claims responsibility for attacks that kill large numbers of civilians.
The Islamic State group has claimed responsibility for several recent bombings in the Afghan capital, including a powerful blast targeting a Nato convoy that killed eight people earlier this month.
Nato said the bomb was a VBIED, or vehicleborne improvised explosive device, which detonated near Kabul’s Zanbaq Square.
“The vigilance and courage of Afghan security forces prevented the VBIED from gaining entry to the Green Zone, but the explosion caused civilian casualties,” the alliance’s Resolute Support mission in Afghanistan said.
The explosion damaged a number of embassies in the area, which houses diplomatic and government buildings and is a maze of concrete blast walls, vehicle barriers and armed security guards.
German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel said the despicable attack killed an Afghan guard from the embassy. He said the bomb had detonated in the immediate vicinity of their embassy.
The BBC said its Afghan driver, Mohammed Nazir, had been killed and four of their journalists wounded.
India’s envoy to Afghanistan, Manpreet Vohra, said the bomb went off about 100m from India’s embassy. All staff were safe, he said, though the blast left considerable damage.
Japan, France, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates and Bulgaria reported damage to their embassies, while India and Pakistan joined in international condemnation of the blast.
Nato, which praised the courage of Afghan forces, slammed the attack as barbaric.
“It highlights the hypocrisy of the enemy who claim that they only target Afghan security forces and foreign forces, yet continue to cause death and suffering among innocent Afghans,” Nato said.
Amnesty International warned that it showed that the conflict in Afghanistan was not winding down but dangerously widening, in a way that should alarm the international community.
Yesterday’s blast was the latest in a long line of attacks in Kabul. The province surrounding the capital had the highest number of casualties in the country in the first three months of this year due to multiple attacks in the city, with civilians bearing the brunt of the violence.