48 Dead In Suicide Bombing On Shia Education Centre In Kabul

48 young men and women were killed in a suicide bombing on a Shia education centre in Kabul yesterday (15 August), Dawn has reported.

The high school graduates were preparing for university entrance exams at the education centre when it was targeted by the attacker believed to be from the Islamic State group. The building was located in the Dasht-i-Barcha area of Kabul. 67 others were wounded and the death toll can go higher, a spokesperson for the public health ministry said.

“There was blood everywhere, all over the room, so scary and horrible,” a person at the site of the attack has been quoted as saying in the report.

The Shia minority in Afghanistan and neighbouring Pakistan are increasingly under attacks by radical Islamist groups including the Islamic State with the community having been attacked at least 13 times in Kabul alone.

“By targeting educational and cultural centres, terrorists have clearly shown they are against all those Islamic principles (that strive) for both men and women to learn and study,” Afghan President Ashraf Ghani said in a statement.

The security situation in Afghanistan has rapidly deteriorated in recent years with the United States and NATO having cut down on their forces on ground in the country. Islamic State has also reared its head in the country clashing for space with Taliban and other terror groups.