 |
| IMAGE: Injured policemen are transported at the back of a police vehicle after a suicide attack in Kabul. |
Agencies: At least
24 people were killed on Monday when two Taliban suicide bombers on foot struck
close to the defence ministry in Kabul during late afternoon rush hour, the
latest assault on the Afghan capital.
Around 91 others were wounded in the assault, which comes as the
Taliban intensify their nationwide offensive against the US-backed government.
The two bombers
blew themselves up in rapid succession, in an attack apparently aimed at
inflicting mass casualties as government workers left the ministry after work.
"The first
explosion occurred on a bridge near the defence ministry. When soldiers,
policemen and civilians rushed to the scene, there was the second
explosion," defence ministry spokesman Mohammad Radmanish told media.
Health ministry
said 24 people were killed in the blasts.
The Italian-run
Emergency Hospital in Kabul tweeted that it had so far received 10 injured
people, with more expected to arrive.
President Ashraf Ghani strongly condemned the attack.
"The enemies
of Afghanistan are losing the fight in the ground battle with security
forces," Ghani said in a statement. "That is why they are attacking,
highways, cities, mosques, schools and ordinary people."
Taliban spokesman
Zabihullah Mujahid said on Twitter that the defence ministry was the object of
the first attack, while police were targeted in the second.
The attack took
place more than a week after 16 people were killed when militants stormed the
AmericanUniversity of Afghanistan in Kabul, in a nearly 10-hour raid that
prompted anguished pleas for help from trapped students.
Explosions and
gunfire rocked the campus in that attack, which came just weeks after two
university professors -- an American and an Australian -- were kidnapped at
gunpoint near the school.
Their whereabouts
are still unknown and no group so far has publicly claimed responsibility for
the abductions, the latest in a series of kidnappings in the conflict-torn
country.
The uptick in violence in the capital comes as the Taliban
escalate nationwide attacks, underscoring the worsening security situation
since NATO forces ended their combat mission at the end of 2014.
Afghan forces
backed by US troops are seeking to head off a potential Taliban takeover of
Lashkar Gah, the capital of the southern opium-rich province of Helmand.
The Taliban have
also closed in on Kunduz -- the northern city they briefly seized last year in
their biggest military victory since the 2001 US invasion -- leaving Afghan
forces stretched on multiple fronts.
But NATO coalition
forces have insisted that neither Kunduz nor Lashkar Gah are at risk of falling
to the insurgents.
