A suicide bomber in Afghanistan’s northern Kunduz province has killed 29 people, mainly members of illegal armed groups that have clashed with security forces and the insurgents in the past, an Afghan official said on Sunday.
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The incident took place in Khanabad district where a gathering of the local militia forces personnel was targeted.
The UN said the attacks were likely to be the product of a Taliban power struggle following the death of its leader Mullah Omar about two weeks ago. And in the eastern Nangarhar province, a drone strike carried out by Afghan forces killed 15 suspected insurgents and wounded nine others on Saturday, according to a provincial police chief.
He said most of those killed were thought to be pro-government militia who have been fighting an offensive launched earlier this year by the Taliban and Central Asian extremists who have sworn allegiance to the Islamic State militant group.
However, local officials including Abdul Wadood Wahidi, a spokesman for the governor of Kunduz, said the dead were pro-government militiamen.
The bombings on Friday in Kabul struck near an army complex, a police academy and a US special forces base, killing at least 51 people, officials said. Authorities said a major operation is underway in Nangarhar aimed at driving the Taliban out of three districts. The victims had been accused of spying.
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It also lays bare the shortcomings of the multi-billion dollar US-led effort to develop self-reliant Afghan forces, suffering large daily casualties and struggling to rein in an ascendant insurgency on their own as the war expands on multiple fronts.
