Afghan citizens angry over failure to protect them from Kabul attack
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KABUL was reeling yesterday from its deadliest attack since 2001, with anguished families burying their dead as authorities cleared away mangled wreckage and public anger grew over the government’s failure to protect citizens in the heart of the Afghani capital.
No group has so far claimed responsibility for Wednesday’s attack, launched from a sewage tanker packed with explosives, which killed at least 90 people, mainly civilians, while wounding hundreds of others.
The attack during the holy month of Ramadan highlighted the ability of militants to strike even in the capital’s most secure district, home to the presidential palace and foreign embassies.
Angry citizens demanded answers over a perceived intelligence failure leading to the attack.
“For how long will we have to tolerate this bloodshed in our country?” a sobbing resident asked on local Tolo News. “I have lost my brother in the blast and the government is constantly failing to provide us with security.”
Authorities swept up debris and shards of glass that littered the streets, and cleared away the charred carcasses of blown-up vehicles, as residents held emotionally charged funerals.
With more than 400 people wounded, the injured spilled over into hospital hallways as huge crowds gathered outside waiting for news of their loved ones or relatives still missing.
Health officials said some victims may never be identified as their bodies were torn to pieces or burned beyond recognition.
Afghanistan’s intelligence agency has blamed the Taliban-allied Haqqani Network for the attack. Afghan President Ashraf Ghani is expected to approve the execution of 11 Taliban and Haqqani prisoners, a government source told reporters, in apparent retaliation.
The Haqqani Network, long thought to have ties to neighboring Pakistan’s shadowy military establishment, is led by Sirajuddin Haqqani — also the Taliban’s deputy leader — and has carried out numerous operations in Kabul, including the 2008 Indian embassy bombing that killed almost 60 people.
The Taliban — currently in the midst of their annual “spring offensive” — denied they were involved, and the Islamic State group has so far not claimed the attack.
Global outrage swelled yesterday over the blast, the deadliest single attack in Kabul since the Taliban were toppled from power in a 2001 US-led invasion.
US President Donald Trump told Ghani in a phone call that the timing of the attack during Ramadan underscores “the barbaric nature of the terrorists who are enemies of all civilized peoples.” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres expressed his “abhorrence.”
The lights at the Eiffel Tower were switched off on Wednesday night to honor the scores of victims. The monument’s lights had already been turned off on Tuesday after suicide blasts in Baghdad killed at least 42.
The explosion, which Kabul residents compared to an earthquake, damaged several embassies in the area.
At least 11 Afghan guards working for the US embassy were among those killed and 11 US citizens working as contractors in Kabul were among the wounded, officials have said.
Germany said an Afghan guard had been killed at its embassy, which was “in the immediate vicinity” of the attack, while several other countries also reported damage to their missions.
Frequent attacks made the city the deadliest place in Afghanistan for civilians in the first quarter of 2017, according to the United Nations.
Afghan troops backed by US and NATO forces have been struggling to beat back the insurgents, and the White House is considering sending thousands more soldiers in the battle against the Taliban.
There are about 8,400 US troops in Afghanistan, and another 5,000 from NATO allies. They mainly serve in an advisory capacity — a far cry from the US presence of more than 100,000 six years ago.
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