Posts Tagged ‘blast’

Wayne Madsen discusses the multiple groups claiming responsibility for the Dec. 30 bombing in Afghanistan that killed seven CIA agents.First he was thought to be an Afghan army officer, then a Pakistani CIA informant, then an army officer from Jordan and still no one is sure.

KABUL, Nov 21 (Reuters) – A rocket hit the outside wall of the luxury Serena hotel in Kabul on Saturday, wounding four people, including two boys, a health ministry official said. Ministry spokesman Ahmad Raaid said an Afghan soldier was also hurt in the attack. “None of the wounds are serious,” he told Reuters. An employee of the Serena Hotel said there was no damage to the hotel itself. Witnesses said police had sealed off roads leading to the building. Several rockets were fired at the hotel three weeks ago, forcing more than 100 people to rush into an underground bunker. On the same day, gunmen killed five foreign U.N. staff in a separate attack on a Kabul guest house. In January 2008, several Taliban gunmen stormed the hotel, which is near the presidential palace, killing six people including a Norwegian journalist. The Norwegian foreign minister, who was staying there at the time, was unhurt.  Since then, security has been stepped up at the hotel. Violence in Afghanistan is at its worst levels since the Taliban was overthrown in 2001. The Islamist militants have spread their insurgency from the south and east of the country into previously peaceful areas. Source

PESHAWAR, Pakistan — A car bomb exploded outside a crowded market in northwestern Pakistan on Tuesday, killing at least 24 people in the latest attack by suspected militants apparently aimed at avenging an army offensive along the Afghan border. The bombing, aimed at causing maximum civilian casualties, was the third blast in as many days in or close to Peshawar, the capital of the North West Frontier Province, an area bordering the tribal region where the army is pushing into a key Taliban and al-Qaida sanctuary. The blast in Charsadda, some 25 miles (40 kilometers) north of Peshawar, was caused by some 90 pounds (40 kilograms) of explosives stuffed into a van, said the senior police chief in Peshawar, Liaqat Ali Khan. Authorities were investigating whether the attack, which killed at least 24 people and wounded 102 others, was carried out by a suicide bomber, he said. Rashid Kaka said he was returning from the mosque to his shop in the market when the bomb exploded, destroying stores on both sides of the road and knocking down electrical wires.

“It was deafening and there were clouds of dust all around. I could not see anything around me,” said Kaka. “Later I saw many bodies lying scattered.” Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi condemned the attack, calling those behind it the “enemies of Islam. No one claimed responsibility, but authorities have blamed similar attacks in recent weeks on the Taliban. The insurgents apparently hope the blasts will weaken the resolve of the army, which launched an offensive in mid-October against militants in South Waziristan, the main Taliban and al-Qaida sanctuary in Pakistan’s tribal area along the Afghan border. On Monday, a suicide bomber in a rickshaw detonated his explosives near a group of policemen in Peshawar, killing three people. A day before, a suicide bomber blew himself up in a market south of Peshawar, killing 12 people, including a mayor who once supported but had turned against the Taliban. Read the rest of this entry »

ISLAMABAD — A bomb blast killed three paramilitary troops Sunday in Pakistan’s Khyber region, where security forces are pressing ahead with an offensive to secure a major supply route for foreign forces in Afghanistan. Also in the northwest, a suicide bomber attempted to attack a security post in the Swat Valley but was killed before he could strike. The incidents show that the region is still dangerous despite the recent arrests of five militant commanders there. The bomb in the Mandiknas area of Khyber targeted a security convoy and was detonated by remote control, said Sadiq Khan, an official at the Khyber agency administrator office. Two soldiers died at the scene and four were wounded. One of the injured soldiers later died at a hospital. Pakistan began its latest offensive in the Khyber tribal region on Sept. 1 and says it has killed more than 150 militants. The fighting has caused thousands of residents to flee. Militants have frequently attacked trucks traveling through the Khyber pass carrying supplies to NATO and US troops in landlocked Afghanistan. Pakistan is under intense U.S. pressure to crack down on al-Qaida and Taliban militants along the Afghan border.

AT Update : The Number of people dead were about 90 according to SBS World News.

Source – The United Nations has called for an investigation into a NATO air strike which killed up to 90 people in Afghanistan. NATO aircraft bombed two fuel tankers which had been hijacked by the Taliban. NATO says most of the dead were members of the Taliban, but local officials say 20 to 30 civilians were also killed and injured. Local police and government leaders say dozens of civilians were gathered around the tanker, trying to scavenge fuel before it was hit. Witnesses say the dead and injured were severely burnt. The UN mission in Afghanistan is sending investigators to the scene near the northern city of Kunduz and NATO also says it will fully investigate the reports of civilian casualties. NATO secretary general, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, says the leader of international troops in Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal, had spoken to Afghan President Hamid Karzai about the air strike. “An investigation team has been sent already to the scene led by an Admiral from ISAF headquarters,” Read the rest of this entry »