By RFE/RL’s Radio Azadi
October 14, 2021
A Taliban police chief has been killed and 11 people wounded in a bomb blast in Asadabad, the capital of Kunar Province, in eastern Afghanistan, local authorities say.
Witnesses told RFE/RL that the bomb targeted a vehicle carrying the Taliban police chief for the Shigal district on October 14.
Local Taliban officials did not disclose details of the incident.
A doctor at the Asadabad Central Hospital, who requested anonymity, told RFE/RL that 12 people injured in the blast had been hospitalized. The doctor confirmed Abdullah Irfan, the Taliban-appointed police chief of Shigal district, had succumbed to his injuries.
Seven civilians, including a schoolboy, were also among the wounded, the doctor added.
No one claimed responsibility for the attack but the Islamic State-Khorasan Province (IS-K) group, which is active in eastern Afghanistan, has claimed similar attacks on the Taliban in the past.
The Taliban has battled IS-K since its emergence in Afghanistan in 2014.
IS-K has claimed responsibility for some of the most recent attacks, including a suicide bombing among worshippers last week in a Shi’ite mosque in Kunduz Province that killed around 100 people.
With reporting by AFP