Rahimi said the attackers, driving a vehicle packed with explosives, targeted a minibus belonging to Kaboora.
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At least 20 others – including passers-by – were wounded.
The privately owned Moby Group has 15 news-gathering offices throughout Afghanistan and business offices in Dubai.
The Taliban have threatened media organizations in the past and in October directly threatened Tolo TV and another popular station, 1TV, purportedly for unfavorable reporting.
Delegates from Afghanistan, Pakistan, China and the United States convened in the Afghan capital Monday for a one-day meeting seeking a negotiated end to the 14-year Taliban insurgency.
The emergence of a free and vibrant media is seen as a major achievement of post-Taliban Afghanistan.
It particularly cited allegations of rape and other crimes against the group during the Taliban’s brief capture of the northern city of Kunduz in September.
A 2014 study by Altai Consulting found that 175 radio and 75 television stations had been set up since the 2001 U.S.-led invasion that toppled the Taliban, who ran the country from 1996-2001. Under the Taliban regime in the 1990s, music and television were banned.
In response to the widespread condemnation, the Taliban on Thursday again justified its attack on Tolo TV workers, saying it aimed at an “intelligence network and not media”.
The attack on Tolo TV was an “atrocity created to undermine Afghanistan’s still fragile media freedom”, the Human Rights Watch organization said in a statement.
They called on all Taliban groups to enter into early peace talks and agreed to meet again in Islamabad on February 6.
“Murdering those who work to enlighten, educate, and entertain will not stop Afghans from exercising their universal human right to freedom of expression”, it said.
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A defense official, speaking Wednesday on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal decisions, said new rules of engagement approved last week permit US commanders in Afghanistan to launch airstrikes against militants affiliated with IS, in the same way that the military targets fighters linked to al-Qaida. It called on all parties to the conflict, including the Taliban, to rescind any threats against the media. By “revealing the truth to the public, the media become unacceptable for the Taliban”, he said.
