Mosque: Attack on clerics in Afghanistan - at least 18 dead

At least 18 people were killed in a suicide attack in the western Afghan province of Herat on Friday, authorities said.

Mosque: Attack on clerics in Afghanistan - at least 18 dead

At least 18 people were killed in a suicide attack in the western Afghan province of Herat on Friday, authorities said. A local cleric from the city of Herat was among the victims, a spokesman for the provincial government confirmed to the Afghan broadcaster Tolonews. Another 23 people were injured.

Local media assumed that the attack was aimed directly at the mosque director. He was considered a prominent supporter of the Taliban in power. According to a police spokesman, the imam was on his way to the mosque to hold Friday prayers. The assassin kissed his hands and detonated the bomb. "I saw many corpses and wounded and many individual pieces of meat," reported an eyewitness to the German Press Agency on the phone from the crime scene.

A few hours earlier, the cleric is said to have met with Taliban Deputy Chief Abdul Ghani Baradar to pay his respects to the Afghan rulers. Since the Taliban took power again in August 2021, attacks on religious sites in the country have increased again. The terrorist militia Islamic State (IS) has claimed responsibility for some of the attacks, especially against religious minorities. IS is also a deadly enemy of the Islamist Taliban. No one initially claimed responsibility for the attack on Friday.

NEXT NEWS