At least 10 killed in Kabul mosque attack on last Friday of Ramadan
Residents say whole neighbourhood shook in blast
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Your support makes all the difference.At least 10 people were killed and 20 wounded when a powerful explosion ripped through a mosque in Kabul on Friday, a Taliban spokesman said.
Local residents said they feared the death toll could rise as hundreds of worshippers were packed in the Khalifa Aga Gul Jan Mosque for prayers on the last Friday of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
The Taliban-appointed interior ministry spokesman, Mohammad Nafi Takor, said he could not provide more details as Taliban security men cordoned off the area.
The source of the explosion was not immediately known and no one has claimed responsibility for the blast.
The explosion was so loud that the neighbourhood of the mosque shook from the blast, residents said, speaking on condition of anonymity, fearing for their own safety.
Ambulances raced to the site, driving up to the end of a narrow street in an eastern neighbourhood of Kabul to reach the mosque, which belongs to Afghanistan’s majority Sunni Muslims.
The explosion was the latest in a series of blasts amid relentless attacks across the country.
Similar attacks on mosques have recently targeted the country’s minority Shia Muslims and were claimed by the so-called Islamic State group’s regional affiliate, known as Islamic State in Khorasan Province or IS-K.
At least nine people were killed and 13 injured after bombs exploded on two passenger vans in the northern city of Mazar-e-Shari on Thursday.
A Taliban spokesperson said the vans were run and used by the local Shia community, a minority sect in Afghanistan that is often targeted in attacks. Isis claimed responsibility for the attack in a Telegram post.
Last week, blasts at a high school in a predominantly Shia Hazara area in western Kabul killed at least six people.
Isis has stepped up its attacks across Afghanistan to become the primary enemy of the Taliban since their takeover of the country last August.
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