KABUL: A series of explosions at a high school and educational center in Kabul on Tuesday killed at least six people and injured many more, including students, police and health authorities said.
Two blasts occurred at the Abdul Rahim Shaheed High School in the capital’s western neighborhood of Dasht-e-Barchi. A nearby tuition center was also targeted in a grenade attack.
“According to initial figures, six of our compatriots were martyred,” Kabul police spokesperson Khalid Zadran said in a statement. “An investigation has been launched into the attack.”
The Ministry of Public Health said at least 20 people were injured.
Abdul Naser, an eyewitness, said the victims were mostly students.
“There was smoke all over the area following the blasts,” he told Arab News. “All casualties were young boys in their teens. We were all so scared.”
The city’s Emergency Hospital, which received some of the wounded, told the media all of them were between the ages of 16 and 19.
There has been no immediate claim of responsibility for the apparent attack and it is possible the death toll could rise.
In May 2021, there was a bombing at the Sayed Al-Shuhada girls’ school in the same area of the Afghan capital, which is home to a large Shiite Hazara community.
The attack killed at least 85 people, mostly teenage girls, as the students were leaving classes to break their Ramadan fast.
At least 6 dead after explosions hit Kabul schools
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At least 6 dead after explosions hit Kabul schools
- Two blasts occurred at a high school in the Afghan capital’s Shiite-dominated neighborhood
- A nearby tuition center was also targeted in a grenade attack
Sri Lanka hospital releases 22 rescued Iranian sailors
- Sri Lankan authorities said the survivors from the Dena were being handled according to international humanitarian law
COLOMBO: Sri Lanka discharged from hospital 22 Iranian sailors who were plucked from life rafts after their warship was sunk by a US submarine, officials said Sunday.
The sailors were treated at Karapitiya Hospital in the southern port city of Galle since Wednesday after the IRIS Dena was torpedoed just outside Sri Lanka’s territorial waters.
“Another 10 are still undergoing treatment,” a medical officer at the hospital told AFP.
He said the bodies of 84 Iranians retrieved from the Indian Ocean were also at the hospital.
Those discharged from hospital overnight had been taken to a beach resort in the same district.
Sri Lankan authorities said the survivors from the Dena were being handled according to international humanitarian law, and the government had contacted the International Committee of the Red Cross for assistance.
The island is also providing safe haven for another 219 Iranian sailors from a second ship, the IRIS Bushehr, that was allowed to berth a day after the Dena was sunk.
Sailors from the Bushehr have been moved to a Sri Lanka Navy camp at Welisara, just north of the capital Colombo, and their ship taken over by Sri Lanka’s navy.
Sri Lanka announced it was taking the Bushehr to the north-eastern port of Trincomalee, but an engine failure and other technical and administrative issues had delayed the movement, a navy spokesman said.
Sri Lanka has denied claims that it was under pressure from Washington not to allow the Iranians to return home, and said Colombo will be guided solely by international law and its own domestic legislation.
A US State Department spokesperson said the disposition of the Bushehr crew and Iranian sailors rescued at sea was up to Sri Lanka.
“The United States, of course, respects and recognizes Sri Lanka’s sovereignty in the handling of this situation,” the spokesperson told AFP in Washington.
India, meanwhile, said Saturday that it had allowed a third Iranian warship, the IRIS Lavan, to dock in one of its ports on “humane” grounds after it too reported engine problems.
The three ships were part of a multi-national fleet review held by India before the war in the Middle East started last week.
“I think it was the humane thing to do, and I think we were guided by that principle,” Indian Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar said on Saturday.
The Lavan docked in the south-west Indian port of Kochi on Wednesday.
“A lot of the people on board were young cadets. They have disembarked and are in a nearby facility,” Jaishankar said.
