Twin Taliban suicide blasts in Kabul kill 24, wound 91

Kabul, Sep 5 (AFP) At least 24 people were killed and 91wounded today in a Taliban double suicide bombing in centralKabul during late afternoon rush hour, the latest assault onthe Afghan capital. The carnage near the defence ministry came as the Talibanramp up their nationwide summer offensive against theUS-backed government. The two bombers on foot blew themselves up in rapidsuccession, in an assault apparently aimed at inflicting masscasualties as government employees left the ministry afterwork. "The first explosion occurred on a bridge near thedefence ministry. When soldiers, policemen and civiliansrushed to the scene, there was the second explosion," defenceministry spokesman Mohammad Radmanish told AFP. Health ministry spokesman Waheed Majroh said the attackleft 24 people dead and 91 others wounded, some of themseriously. "The casualties could rise still further," Majroh said. The Italian-run Emergency Hospital in Kabul tweeted thatit had so far received 21 injured people, four of whom died onarrival. President Ashraf Ghani strongly condemned the attack andoffered condolences to the families of the victims. "The enemies of Afghanistan have lost their ability tofight the Security and Defense Forces of the country," Ghanisaid in a statement. "That is why they are attacking highways, cities,mosques, schools and common people." Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said on Twitter thatthe defence ministry was the object of the first attack, whilepolice were targeted in the second. The attack took place more than a week after 16 peoplewere killed when militants stormed the American University ofAfghanistan in Kabul, in a nearly 10-hour raid that promptedanguished pleas for help from trapped students. Explosions and gunfire rocked the campus in that attack,which came just weeks after two university professors — anAmerican and an Australian — were kidnapped at gunpoint nearthe school. Their whereabouts are still unknown and no group so farhas publicly claimed responsibility for the abductions, thelatest in a series of kidnappings in the conflict-torncountry. The uptick in violence in the capital comes as theTaliban escalate nationwide attacks, underscoring theworsening security situation since NATO forces ended theircombat mission at the end of 2014. Afghan forces backed by US troops are seeking to head offa potential Taliban takeover of Lashkar Gah, the capital ofthe southern opium-rich province of Helmand. The Taliban have also closed in on Kunduz — the northerncity they briefly seized last year in their biggest militaryvictory since the 2001 US invasion — leaving Afghan forcesstretched on multiple fronts. (AFP)ZH