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60 SHIITES KILLED IN AFGHAN’S SECTERIAN VIOLENCE

Published December 6, 2011

60 SHIITES KILLED IN AFGHAN’S SECTERIAN

 

 VIOLENCE

 


 


Two bomb blasts apparently targeting Shiaa Muslim shrines as hundreds of people gathered to mark the day of Ashura have killed at least 60 people and injured scores more, according to Afghan police and media reports on Tuesday 12/06/2011.


 


At least 56 people were killed by a suicide bomber who detonated explosives at the gate of the Abu-Ul Fazil shrine in the capital Kabul on Tuesday, many of them children, the AFP news agency reported. The ministry off health said that more than 100 people had also been injured (see also -Shiites 12.05.11).


 


In a separate attack, a bicycle bomb near a mosque in the northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif killed four worshippers, a district police chief said.


 


The Taliban condemned the bomb attacks in Kabul and the northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif as the brutal work of “enemies”, a spokesperson for the armed group said. “Very sadly we heard that there were explosions in Kabul and Mazar-e-Sharif, where people were killed by the enemy’s un-Islamic and inhuman activity,” Zabiullah Mujahid said in a statement published on their website.

 


The blasts occurred as Shias gathered to carry out religious rituals to mark one of the most significant days in their calendar. Ashura, a public holiday in Afghanistan, is the Shia day of mourning commemorating the martyrdom of Hussein, a grandson of the Prophet Muhammed (see -ABYSS IN ISLAM).

Shias were banned from marking Ashura in public under the Taliban. This year, there are more Ashura monuments around the city than in recent years, including black shrines and flags.


 


Meanwhile, a bomb placed in a motorcycle exploded in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar on Tuesday afternoon, injuring three civilians, a spokesmfan for the provincial governor said. The site of the Kandahar blast was not near any mosque or shrine.


 


The attacks came shortly after a major conference on Afghanistan’s future, held in the German city of Bonn, 10 years after talks there which put in place an interim government after US-led troops toppled the Taliban (see – Petraeus W Plan). However, Pakistan and the Taliban – both seen as pivotal to any end to the fighting in Afghanistan – decided to stay away from the talks, undermining already modest hopes for real progress.

 

* Few days earlier, on Tuesday 11/29/2011, Karachi police in neighboring Pakistan have arrested 5 Jundallah operatives who were planning attacks on the Shiaa community in Karachi. Police also seized huge cache of arms and hit lists.


  


The terrorists have been identified as Syed Kamran alias Waqar, Salar Muhammad alias Khalid, Amjad Khan alias Kargil, Farhan Khan alias Hussain, and Muhammad Munir alias Azeem.


 


The police say former Jundallah chief Hamja Jofi — also known as Haji Mumtaz — who established the group in 2003 in the Waziristan tribal area of northwestern Pakistan – FATA, and the head of the terrorist group’s Karachi branch, Amir Arif, alias Raza, were killed in a missile attack in August 2011.

 


* A man, who gave his name as Ali Sher-e-Khuda, told the BBC on Saturday 12/10/2011, that the Kabul shrine was part of a campaign to target Shiaa Muslims in Afghanistan. He added his group is inspired by Pakistan’s Sunni militant Lashkar-e-Jhangvi organization. Ali Sher-e-Khuda said the group had not officially sanctioned the Kabul attack, but did not deny his men carried it out.


 

* Related topics ;


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