Kabul bombing targets clerics after fatwa against violence
A suicide bomber killed eight people at a gathering of Afghanistan’s senior clerics yesterday, shortly after they issued a fatwa declaring militant attacks un-Islamic and called on Taliban insurgents to join peace talks.
“One police man and seven civilians were killed and around 14 are injured,” Kabul police spokesman Hashmat Stanikzai said. More were feared dead.
About 2,000 leaders were gathered at the time of the blast.
The Taliban has waged war against foreign forces and western-backed governments since the 2001 US-led invasion that deposed it.
“The war in Afghanistan is illegal and has no root in Sharia,” the clerics said. “We, the religious Ulema, call on the Taliban to respond positively to the peace offer of the Afghan government in order to prevent further bloodshed in the country.”
“We were all leaving the venue after the meeting. I was in my car at the gate of the Loya Jirga tent when the explosion happened,” Abdul Basir Haqqani, a Ulema member, told The National.
While the Taliban has criticised the members of the Ulema Council for being “pro-government”, they denied involvement in the attack.
Afghanistan’s Ulema Council, a government-funded but autonomous body of religious leaders, was set up after the fall of the Taliban in 2002.
As of last year, the council had more than 3,000 members – religious scholars and clerics, both Sunni and Shiite.