The FINANCIAL -- Afghan President Hamid
Karzai said on Tuesday that twin bomb attacks which killed at least 58
people at Afghan shrines were the first "terrorist" acts on an important
holy day, told gulfnews.
The attacks occurred just a day after an international conference in Bonn on the future of Afghanistan after NATO troops pull out at the end of 2014.The bombings - one in Kabul which ripped through a crowd of worshippers including children, and another in the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif - took place on the Shiite holy day of Ashura.Dozens killed in Afghanistan shrine blasts
Afghan President Hamid Karzai said on Tuesday that twin bomb attacks which killed at least 58 people at Afghan shrines were the first "terrorist" acts on an important holy day
Berlin: Afghan President Hamid Karzai said on Tuesday that twin bomb attacks which killed at least 58 people at Afghan shrines were the first "terrorist" acts on an important holy day.
It was "the first time that, on such an important religious day in Afghanistan, terrorism of that horrible nature is taking place," Karzai said at a joint press conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
The attacks occurred just a day after an international conference in Bonn on the future of Afghanistan after NATO troops pull out at the end of 2014.
Karzai also appealed to Afghanistan's neighbour Pakistan, which boycotted the Bonn meeting, saying it had "a very important role to play in the peace process in Afghanistan".
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The bombings - one in Kabul which ripped through a crowd of worshippers including children, and another in the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif - took place on the Shiite holy day of Ashura.
A total of 58 people were killed and at least 150 others wounded in twin bombings near Shiite shrines in Kabul on Tuesday, the health ministry said.
The first blast ripped through a crowd of worshippers at the entrance to a riverside shrine in central Kabul, where hundreds of singing Shiite Muslims had gathered to mark Ashura. An official said it was believed the bomber had arrived with a group of Shiite pilgrims from Logar province, south of Kabul.
A young girl, dressed in a green shalwar kameez that was smeared in blood, stood shrieking as she was surrounded by the crumpled, piled-up bodies of children. Men and women at the scene sobbed as they surveyed the carnage, and screamed slogans denouncing Al Qaida and the Taliban.
In Mazar-i-Sharif, police spokesman Lal Mohammad Ahmadzai said that the blast was caused by a bicycle bomb, adding that four other people had also been injured.
And police said that five people were wounded by a motorcycle bomb in the southern city of Kandahar, the Taliban's heartland. But the police said the attack was unconnected to Ashura.
The blasts came the day after delegates at a key international conference in Bonn agreed to extend international support for Afghanistan to 2024 following the scheduled withdrawal of all foreign combat troops by the end of 2014.
Shiites beat and whip themselves in religious fervour during the 10-day Ashura ceremonies, which began on November 27 but peak Tuesday. They mark the seventh-century killing of a grandson of the Prophet Mohammad.
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