By RFE/RL’s Radio Free Afghanistan
October 7, 2019
At least 10 civilians, including a child, were killed after explosives placed in a rickshaw blew up next to a bus carrying Afghan army recruits in Afghanistan’s eastern Nangarhar Province, an official said on October 7.
Ataullah Khogyani, a spokesman for the provincial governor, said 27 other people were wounded in the attack in the local capital, Jalalabad.
Khogyani said those wounded, some of them in critical condition, had been transported to the hospital.
No group has claimed the attack. Both the Islamic State militant group and the Taliban are active in Nangarhar.
According to the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA), 1,366 civilians were killed and 2,446 others wounded this year up to June 30.
A child rights group said that every single child born and raised in Afghanistan in the past 18 years has experienced and been affected by war and conflict.
The Save the Children statement was issued on the day marking 18 years since the U.S.-led intervention in Afghanistan following the September 11, 2001, attacks in the United States.
According to the statement, “an estimated 20 million children wake up every day in fear of gunshots or bombs and being killed or maimed in their streets, schools or homes.”
The statement said 12,500 children were either killed or maimed between 2015 and 2018, and 3.7 million children — 60 percent of them girls — are out of school, with 3.8 million children in need of humanitarian assistance.
With reporting by AP, AFP, and dpa
Copyright (c) 2019. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave NW, Ste 400, Washington DC 20036.
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