Afghan Women Stage Protest after Kabul Bombing
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – Women from Afghanistan's minority Hazara community staged a protest on Saturday after a suicide bombing that took place in an educational facility and left more than 35 people dead on Friday.
A suicide bomber detonated himself in the study hall of the Kaj Education Center in Dasht-e-Barchi, a predominantly Hazara neighborhood west of Kabul, the Afghan capital.
The majority of the neighborhood's residents are Afghan Hazara Shiites, who have recently been the victims of brutal suicide attacks by terrorist groups like Daesh (ISIL or ISIS).
The death toll had increased to 35, the UN reported on Saturday. It said that more than 20 of those killed were women and girls.
"The latest casualty figures from the attack number at least 35 fatalities, with an additional 82 wounded," the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) said in a statement.
Afghan women gathered in front of a hospital in Dasht-e-Barchi where some of the injured and victims of the attack are hospitalized, chanting, “Stop Hazara genocide, it’s not a crime to be a Shiite.”
"Yesterday's attack was against the Hazaras and Hazara girls," protester Farzana Ahmadi, 19, told AFP. "We demand a stop to this genocide. We staged the protest to demand our rights."
The Daesh terrorist group claimed responsibility for the attack hours after the explosion in the center.
The Hazara community, the poorest of the country’s ethnic groups, accounts for about 22 percent of Afghanistan’s population. Its members have been targeted in several large-scale kidnappings and killings across Afghanistan in the past.
In May last year, at least 85 people – mainly girl students – were killed and about 300 wounded when three bombs exploded near their school in Dasht-e-Barchi.
In October 2020, Daesh admitted to attacking an educational center in the same area that killed 24 people, including students.
In May 2020, the group was blamed for a bloody attack on a maternity ward of a hospital in the same neighborhood that killed 25 people, including new mothers.
Daesh has a foothold in eastern and northern Afghanistan, particularly in Nangarhar, which is regarded as its base in the war-torn country. It has recently claimed responsibility for several attacks across Afghanistan.
Since returning to power, the Taliban have pledged to provide security for minority groups in Afghanistan. However, Amnesty International said Friday's attack is a reminder of the utter inability and failure of the Taliban to protect the lives of the people of this country.
