Another spontaneous combustion due to an overheated inner spiritual struggle (it’s almost summer, you know).
By Rahim Faiez for the Associated Press:
KABUL, Afghanistan – The deadliest insurgent attack since the U.S.-led invasion
of Afghanistan in 2001 destroyed a bus full of police instructors at Kabul’s busiest transportation hub on Sunday, killing 35 people and wounding 52, officials
said.
The enormous suicide blast, which raised the specter of an increase in
Iraq-style bombings with heavy casualties, was at least the fourth attack against a bus carrying Afghan police or army soldiers in Kabul in the last year. The blast sheared off the bus’ metal sidings and roof, leaving a charred frame.
“Never in my life have I heard such a sound,” said Ali Jawad, a 48-year-old who
was selling phone cards nearby. “A big fireball followed. I saw blood and a decapitated man
thrown out of the bus.”
The explosion was the fifth suicide attack in Afghanistan in three days,
part of a sharp spike in violence around the country. In the south, in Kandahar province, a roadside bomb killed three members of the U.S.-led coalition and an Afghan interpreter. The
soldiers’ nationalities were not released, but most in the coalition are
American.
Condemning the Kabul attack, President Hamid Karzai said the “enemies of
Afghanistan” were trying to stop the development of Afghan security forces, a key component
in the U.S.- NATO strategy of handing over security responsibilities to the Afghan
government one day, allowing Western forces to leave.
A self-described Taliban spokesman, Qari Yousef Ahmadi, said a Taliban suicide
bomber named Mullah Asim Abdul Rahman caused the blast. Ahmadi called an Associated Press reporter from an undisclosed location. His claim could not be verified.
Zemeri Bashary, the spokesman for the Interior Ministry, said late Sunday that 35 were killed and 52 wounded in the blast. Karzai’s office said 22 police instructors died, indicating that 13 of the dead were civilians.
The various human rights groups will condemn that, if and when they feel like it.