AFGHANS BURY THE DEAD FROM BLOODY BLASTS NEAR SCHOOL IN KABUL

KABUL: Dozens of young girls were buried on Sunday at a desolate hilltop cemetery in Kabul, a day after a secondary school was targeted in the bloodiest attack in Afghanistan in over a year.

A series of blasts outside the school during a peak holiday shopping period killed at least 68 people, mostly female students, and wounded more than 100 in Dasht-e-Barchi, a west Kabul suburb populated mostly by Hazara Shias.

The government blamed the Taliban for the carnage, but the insurgents denied responsibility and issued a statement saying the nation needed to “safeguard and look after educational centres and institutions”.

Saturday’s blasts came as the United States military continues to withdraw its last 2,500 troops from the violence-wracked country despite faltering peace efforts between the Taliban and Afghan government to end a decades-long war.

Interior ministry spokesman Tareq Arian told reporters that a car bomb detonated in front of the Sayed Al-Shuhada girls school on Saturday, and when the students rushed out in panic, two more devices exploded.

On Sunday, relatives buried the dead at a hilltop site known as “Martyrs Cemetery”, where victims of attacks against the Hazaras are laid to rest.