Kabul mosque explosion kills 10

A powerful explosion tore through a mosque in the Afghan capital Kabul on Friday, killing at least 10 people and injuring up to 30, a Taliban spokesman said.

Hundreds of worshipers had gathered for prayers on the last Friday of Ramadan and the Khalifa Aga Gul Jan mosque was packed, local residents said, fearing the death toll could rise further.

Taliban-appointed Interior Ministry spokesman Mohammad Nafi Takor could not provide further details and Taliban security agents cordoned off the area. The source of the explosion was not immediately known and no one claimed responsibility for the explosion.

Initially, at least 20 injuries were reported to have been reported, but Khalid Zadran, spokesman for the Taliban-appointed police chief in Kabul, later raised the number to 30. The death toll remained at 10, he said. he says and also tweeted that “Security agencies are investigating the incidentnt”.

The blast was so strong that the mosque area shook from the blast, residents said on condition of anonymity, fearing for their own safety.

Ambulances rushed to the site, driving to the end of a narrow street in a neighborhood in eastern Kabul to reach the mosque, which is owned by Afghanistan’s majority Sunni Muslims.

On April 21, a bomb attack claimed by the Islamic State (IS) group in a Shiite mosque in Mazar-i-Sharif, in the north of the country, left at least 12 dead and 58 injured. The next day, at least 36 people were killed in another bomb attack on a mosque frequented by Sufis during Friday prayers in Kunduz, northeast Afghanistan.