The Taliban have claimed credit for today’s suicide attack outside Camp Eggers, a large base in the heart of a secured area of Kabul that hosts the Combined Security Transition Command – Afghanistan and other ISAF units. The suicide bomber killed six people and wounded five more, according to Afghan officials. The officials claimed that the suicide attack was carried out by a 14-year-old boy, while the Taliban said a 28-year-old man executed the attack. From Al Jazeera:
The Taliban took responsibility for the attack, saying they had dispatched a bomber to target the Kabul offices of the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
“One of our mujahideen targeted an important intelligence office used for recruiting Americans and Afghans for spying,” Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said.
The bomber blew himself up near the entrance of Camp Eggers, a NATO spokeswoman said, referring to a sprawling base that is home to 2,500 coalition trainers.
Al Jazeera’s Bernard Smith, reporting from Kabul, said that police reports blame a lone suicide bomber wearing an explosive vest. The teenager approached his target on a bicycle, police said.
“This attack was the near the entrance of the compound – a gate where people go in and out of the headquarters. I have been through this entrance before, and you have to go through a number of barriers to get in,” he reported.
The Taliban however claimed that the attacker was 28 years old, and not a child as claimed by officials.
ISAF seized on the Afghan officials’ report that a teenaged boy carried out the suicide attack, and issued the following statement:
The International Security Assistance Force condemns today’s suicide attack in Kabul, which killed several innocent Afghan civilians. According to reports from Afghan security officials, who immediately arrived on scene to secure the area, the suicide attacker today was a teenaged youth. Attacks like these exploit vulnerable individuals, coercing them into committing horrible acts. Initial casualty reports indicate only Afghan civilians suffered injuries or died from the explosion.
“If these reports are true, by taking advantage of an impressionable child to carry out this attack, the insurgents display cowardice. Forcing underage youth to do their dirty work again proves the insurgency’s despicable tactics. They are completely detached from Afghan society and the interests of the Afghan people who desire peace and stability in their country,” said Brig. Gen. Günter Katz, ISAF spokesman.
The Taliban claimed credit for the attack in a statement on Voice of Jihad, which has been reproduced below:
12 noon, a brave Mujahid of the Islamic Emirate heroically stormed a clandestine CIA-run headquarter in Shash Darak, Kabul city, the capital of the country and blew up explosive-filled vest, killing at least 5 high-level US secret agents, Mujahideen officials said.
Saturday’s successful operation carried out by a 28-year old Muhammad Agha, coming from Logar province is considered one of the worst single-day attacks for the US terrorist forces since the “Operation Badr” initiated this year.
There is absolutely no truth in what the Kabul slave administration says about this effective operation by a teenage martyr attacker as he was about 28 year old. The claims of the puppets and other US-led media outlets in this respect are, therefore, strongly rejected.
Today’s suicide attack is the first of its kind in Kabul since June 22, when a Haqqani Network suicide assault team stormed a hotel in the capital.
During the past several months, the National Directorate of Security has heavily targeted the Kabul Attack Network, the terrorist alliance that plots and executes attacks in the capital and includes the Haqqani Network, and has rolled up several terror cells plotting attacks in Kabul [see LWJ report, Afghan intelligence thwarts terror plots in Kabul, Logar, and Parwan].
The Kabul Attack Network is made up of fighters from the Taliban, the Haqqani Network, and Hizb-i-Islami Gulbuddin, and cooperates with terror groups such as the Lashkar-e-Taiba and al Qaeda. Top Afghan intelligence officials have linked the Kabul Attack Network to Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate as well. The network’s tentacles extend outward from Kabul into the surrounding provinces of Logar, Wardak, Nangarhar, Kapisa, Ghazni, and Zabul, a US intelligence official told The Long War Journal.
The Kabul Attack Network is led by Dawood (or Daud) and Taj Mir Jawad, military and intelligence officials have told The Long War Journal. Dawood is the Taliban’s shadow governor for Kabul, while Taj Mir Jawad is a top commander in the Haqqani Network. In the US military files that were released by WikiLeaks, Taj Mir Jawad is identified as a key Haqqani Network leader.
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2 Comments
My friends who know and live at Camp Eggers said that the civilians killed were actually little children who sell bracelets to the American serviceman and women who walk back and forth between ISAF and Camp Eggers.
A friend of mine is stationed here and he always talked about this adorable 9yr old girl whose parents made her sell stuff on the side of the road. She couldn’t believe that kids in america don’t have to work too. She was one of the kids killed in this attack. Here is what my friend wrote to me about the incident: “I found out some pretty
grim details on the incident. Apparently, the 14 year old suicide
bomber arrived on the street where the kids set up shop everyday. All
11 kids approached him and asked him what he was doing there and told
him to leave. After they surrounded him, one of the kids ran over to
one of the Afghan MP’s and told him that there was something wrong with
the “new kid,” as the Afghan MP’s began to run over to the bombers
location he detonated himself. Apparently, there was very little of
Parawana left after the blast. 9 kids dead, 2 kids severely injured, 2
Afghan MP’s were also injured. The crime scene photos are brutal
because we could identify the majority of the kids.
There has been zero media coverage on their deaths at all, and the
locals appear to really care less. You would expect a local revolt
against the group that claimed responsibility for the suicide attack
(Haqqani network) but there is none! Pure evil brother. They are more
concerned with Marines peeing on dead Taliban than 9 little kids blown
to bits. I wish these cowards would face us head on, but they won’t.
They launch mortars and rockets from the mountains and run away or set
IED’s in the street under garbage mounds then once again run away or
watch from a distance, real tough.”