KABUL: Afghan protesters on Wednesday blocked the main highway linking Afghanistan with Pakistan following a suicide attack a day earlier which targeted a peaceful rally and claimed 68 lives, officials said.
The demonstration, held in the eastern Nangarhar province, was to protest against a local police commander, Bilal Shah, who some villagers accuse of human rights abuses, including murders.
Atta Ullah Khogyani, the spokesman for the Nangarhar province, said Shah has been arrested by provincial officials and a government delegation from Kabul is heading to the province to investigate the matter.
“The toll has jumped to 68 from 32 from yesterday. On top of that 165 people have been wounded,” Khogyani said.
No group has claimed responsibility for the attack yet which came hours after small blasts went off near some schools in Jalalabad, the provincial capital of Nangarhar, near the border with Pakistan. Jalabad has witnessed deadly strikes by affiliates of Daesh in recent months.
The Kabul delegation will focus on the motive of the attack and investigate whether the rally was deliberately targeted by Shah or his supporters, a provincial source, requesting anonymity, said.
Recently, Shah was arrested for a brief period over allegations made by locals, but was later freed, the source said.
The attack comes amid a surge of strikes by Deash and Taliban insurgents elsewhere in the country since last week in which more than 200 people have been killed.
