ISLAMABAD: A suicide bombing in the Afghan capital on Wednesday killed the Taliban refugee minister and two others, officials said, in the most brazen attack on a member of the Taliban inner circle since they returned to power three years ago.
The explosion struck inside the ministry, killing Khalil Haqqani, officials said. His last official photo showed him at a meeting chaired by the deputy prime minister, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, earlier Wednesday.
Khalil Haqqani is the uncle of Sirajuddin Haqqani, the acting interior minister who leads a powerful network within the Taliban.
Haqqani was the most high-profile casualty of a bombing in Afghanistan since the Taliban returned to power and the first Cabinet member to be killed since the takeover. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the blast.
The government’s chief spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahid, said in a post on X that Haqqani’s death was a great loss and described him as a tireless holy warrior who spent his life defending Islam.
Haqqani’s killing may be the biggest blow to the Taliban since their return to power given his stature and influence, according to Michael Kugelman, director of the Wilson Center’s South Asia Institute. It also comes at a time when the Taliban have staked their legitimacy on restoring peace after decades of war, he added.
“The killing of a top Haqqani leader inside one of its own ministries undercuts that core narrative,” he said.
Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar condemned the killing as a “terrorist attack.”
“Pakistan unequivocally condemns terrorism in all its forms and manifestations,” Dar said, adding his government was in touch with Kabul to get further details.
The Daesh group’s affiliate, a major rival of the ruling Taliban, has carried out previous attacks across Afghanistan.
In early September, one of its suicide bombers in a southwestern Kabul neighborhood killed at least six people, wounding 13 others.
But suicide attacks have become increasingly rare since the Taliban seized power in August 2021 and US and NATO forces withdrew. Such attacks have mostly targeted minority Shiite Muslims, especially in the capital.
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An explosion in the Afghan capital kills the Taliban refugee minister
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An explosion in the Afghan capital kills the Taliban refugee minister
- The explosion struck inside the ministry, killing Khalil Haqqani, officials said
- His last official photo showed him at a meeting chaired by the deputy prime minister, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, earlier Wednesday
Faced with Trump, Greenlanders try to reassure their children
NUUK: In a coffee shop in Greenland’s capital Nuuk, Lykke Lynge looked fondly at her four kids as they sipped their hot chocolate, seemingly oblivious to the world’s convulsions.
Since Donald Trump returned to the White House last year with a renewed ambition to seize Greenland, international politics has intruded into the Arctic island’s households.
Dictated by the more or less threatening pronouncements of the US president, it has been an unsettling experience for some people here — but everyone is trying to reassure their children.
Lynge, a 42-year-old lawyer, relied on her Christian faith.
“There’s a lot of turmoil in the world,” she said. “But even if we love our country, we have even higher values that allow us to sleep soundly and not be afraid,” she said.
As early as January 27, 2025, one week after Donald Trump’s inauguration, the Greenlandic authorities published a guide entitled “How to talk to children in times of uncertainty?“
“When somebody says they will come to take our country or they will bomb us or something, then of course children will get very scared because they cannot navigate for themselves in all this news,” said Tina Dam, chief program officer for Unicef in the Danish territory.
- Unanswerable questions -
This guide — to which the UN agency for children contributed — recommends parents remain calm and open, listen to their children and be sensitive to their feelings, and limit their own news consumption.
As in many parts of the world, social media, particularly TikTok, has become the primary source of information for young people.
Today, children have access to a lot of information not meant for them, said Dam — “and definitely not appropriate for their age,” she added.
“So that’s why we need to be aware of that as adults and be protective about our children and be able to talk with our children about the things they hear — because the rhetoric is quite aggressive.”
But reassuring children is difficult when you do not have the answers to many of the questions yourself.
Arnakkuluk Jo Kleist, a 41-year-old consultant, said she talked a lot with her 13-year-old daughter, Manumina.
The teenager is also immersed in TikTok videos but “doesn’t seem very nervous, luckily, as much as maybe we are,” she added.
“Sometimes there are questions she’s asking — about what if this happens — that I don’t have any answers to” — because no one actually has the answer to such questions, she said.
- ‘Dear Donald Trump’ -
The Arctic territory’s Inuit culture also helped, said Kleist.
“We have a history and we have conditions in our country where sometimes things happen and we are used to being in situations that are out of our control,” said Kleist.
“We try to adapt to it and say, well, what can I do in this situation?“
Some Greenlandic children and teenagers are also using social media to get their message out to the world.
Seven-year-old Marley and his 14-year-old sister Mila were behind a viral video viewed more than two million times on Instagram — the equivalent of 35 times the population of Greenland.
Serious in subject but lighthearted in tone, the boy addresses the American president.
“Dear Donald Trump, I have a message for you: you are making Greenlandic kids scared.”
Accompanied by hard stares, some serious finger-wagging and mostly straight faces, he and his sister go on to tell Trump: “Greenland is not for sale.”
“It’s a way to cope,” his mother, Paninnguaq Heilmann-Sigurdsen, told AFP of the video. “It’s kid-friendly, but also serious.
“I think it’s a balance between this is very serious, but also, this is with kids.”
Since Donald Trump returned to the White House last year with a renewed ambition to seize Greenland, international politics has intruded into the Arctic island’s households.
Dictated by the more or less threatening pronouncements of the US president, it has been an unsettling experience for some people here — but everyone is trying to reassure their children.
Lynge, a 42-year-old lawyer, relied on her Christian faith.
“There’s a lot of turmoil in the world,” she said. “But even if we love our country, we have even higher values that allow us to sleep soundly and not be afraid,” she said.
As early as January 27, 2025, one week after Donald Trump’s inauguration, the Greenlandic authorities published a guide entitled “How to talk to children in times of uncertainty?“
“When somebody says they will come to take our country or they will bomb us or something, then of course children will get very scared because they cannot navigate for themselves in all this news,” said Tina Dam, chief program officer for Unicef in the Danish territory.
- Unanswerable questions -
This guide — to which the UN agency for children contributed — recommends parents remain calm and open, listen to their children and be sensitive to their feelings, and limit their own news consumption.
As in many parts of the world, social media, particularly TikTok, has become the primary source of information for young people.
Today, children have access to a lot of information not meant for them, said Dam — “and definitely not appropriate for their age,” she added.
“So that’s why we need to be aware of that as adults and be protective about our children and be able to talk with our children about the things they hear — because the rhetoric is quite aggressive.”
But reassuring children is difficult when you do not have the answers to many of the questions yourself.
Arnakkuluk Jo Kleist, a 41-year-old consultant, said she talked a lot with her 13-year-old daughter, Manumina.
The teenager is also immersed in TikTok videos but “doesn’t seem very nervous, luckily, as much as maybe we are,” she added.
“Sometimes there are questions she’s asking — about what if this happens — that I don’t have any answers to” — because no one actually has the answer to such questions, she said.
- ‘Dear Donald Trump’ -
The Arctic territory’s Inuit culture also helped, said Kleist.
“We have a history and we have conditions in our country where sometimes things happen and we are used to being in situations that are out of our control,” said Kleist.
“We try to adapt to it and say, well, what can I do in this situation?“
Some Greenlandic children and teenagers are also using social media to get their message out to the world.
Seven-year-old Marley and his 14-year-old sister Mila were behind a viral video viewed more than two million times on Instagram — the equivalent of 35 times the population of Greenland.
Serious in subject but lighthearted in tone, the boy addresses the American president.
“Dear Donald Trump, I have a message for you: you are making Greenlandic kids scared.”
Accompanied by hard stares, some serious finger-wagging and mostly straight faces, he and his sister go on to tell Trump: “Greenland is not for sale.”
“It’s a way to cope,” his mother, Paninnguaq Heilmann-Sigurdsen, told AFP of the video. “It’s kid-friendly, but also serious.
“I think it’s a balance between this is very serious, but also, this is with kids.”
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