Assault on Sikh temple in Afghanistan’s capital kills two By Reuters

By Mohammad Yunus Yawar

KABUL (Reuters) – An assault on a Sikh temple within the Afghan capital of Kabul on Saturday killed not less than two individuals and injured seven, officers stated, one other lethal incident in a spate of violence focusing on minorities and locations of worship.

Gray smoke billowed over the realm in photographs aired by home broadcaster Tolo. A Taliban inside spokesman stated attackers had laden a automotive with explosives but it surely had detonated earlier than reaching its goal.

“There have been round 30 individuals contained in the temple,” stated a temple official, Gornam Singh. “We do not know what number of of them are alive or what number of useless.”

A spokesman for Kabul’s commander stated his forces had taken management of the realm and cleared it of attackers. One Sikh worshipper had been killed within the assault and one Taliban fighter killed in the course of the clearing operation, he added.

There was no instant declare of duty for the blast.

Since taking energy in August, the Taliban say they’ve elevated safety in Afghanistan and eliminated the nation from militant threats, though worldwide officers and analysts say the danger of a resurgence in militancy stays.

The Islamic State militant group has claimed some assaults in latest months.

The blast on Saturday was extensively condemned as considered one of a sequence of assaults focusing on minorities, with a press release from neighbouring Pakistan saying its authorities was “severely involved on the latest spate of terrorist assaults on locations of worship in Afghanistan.”

The U.N.’s mission to Afghanistan stated in a press release that minorities within the nation wanted to be protected and India’s President Narendra Modi stated on Twitter (NYSE:) he was “shocked” by assault.

Sikhs are a tiny non secular minority in largely Muslim Afghanistan, comprising about 300 households earlier than the nation fell to the Taliban. However many left afterwards, say members of the neighborhood and media.

Like different non secular minorities, Sikhs have been a continuous goal of violence in Afghanistan. An assault at one other temple in Kabul in 2020 that killed 25 was claimed by Islamic State.

Saturday’s explosion follows a blast at a mosque within the northern metropolis of Kunduz the day gone by that killed one individual and injured two, in accordance with authorities.