KABUL (AP/AFP) – A powerful explosion ripped through a mosque in the Afghan capital of Kabul on Friday, killing at least 10 people and wounding 20, a Taliban spokesman said.
Hundreds of worshippers had gathered for prayers on the last Friday of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan and the Khalifa Aga Gul Jan Mosque was packed, said local residents, fearing the casualty toll could rise further.
The Taliban-appointed interior ministry spokesman, Mohammad Nafi Takor, could not provide more details and Taliban security men cordoned off the area. The source of the explosion was not immediately known and no one has claimed responsibility for the blast.
The explosion was so loud that the neighborhood of the mosque shook from the blast, the residents said, speaking on condition of anonymity, fearing for their own safety.
Ambulances raced to the site, driving up to the end of a narrow street in an eastern neighborhood of Kabul to reach the mosque.
The explosion was the latest in a series of such blasts amid relentless attacks across the country.
A day earlier, at least nine people were killed and more than a dozen injured in two separate bomb explosions that rocked the northern city of Mazar Sharif in Afghanistan.
The blasts hit two minibuses in the city on Thursday, targeting Shia Muslim passengers, according to the police.
“The targets appear to be Shia passengers,” Balkh provincial police spokesman Asif Waziri told AFP, adding 13 people were wounded in the blasts.
According to Waziri, the blasts took place within minutes of each other in different districts in the evening, when citizens were heading home from work.
“The enemies of Afghanistan are creating tension and division among our people,” he said.
Mazar-e-Sharif is already reeling from a recent major bomb attack at a mosque that killed dozens of people. Scores of people have lost their lives in a series of terrorist attacks across the country over the past few weeks. The victims have mostly been from the Shia Hazara minority.
Meanwhile, Taliban chief called again Friday for the international community to recognize the government, saying the world had become a “small village” and proper diplomatic relations would help solve the country’s problems.
No nation has formally recognized the movement installed by the Taliban after they seized power in August and reintroduced the rule that is increasingly excluding women from public life.
In a written message ahead of the Eid al-Fitr holiday that marks the end of Ramadan, Hibatullah Akhundzada did not mention international sticking points -- including reopening secondary schools for girls.
Instead, he said recognition should come first “so that we may address our problems formally and within diplomatic norms and principles”.