Three weeks ago, two Taliban suicide bombers killed 34 people when they attacked a convoy of buses carrying newly graduated police officers in Kabul.
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Saturday’s protest over a multimillion-dollar power line that demonstrators want routed through two provinces with large Hazara populations, had become a touchstone for a wider sense of injustice.
The attack follows a series of kidnappings and killings of Hazaras and has renewed worries over tensions in majority Sunni-Muslim Afghanistan, which has been largely spared the sectarian strife that has plagued other Muslim neighbors in the region. Secondary attacks have been known to target people who come to the aid of those wounded in a first explosion. People fleeing from the scene were covered in blood and many were crying. They were gathered together as free citizens, protected by courageous security forces who also fell victim in the line of duty.
Only one attacker successfully detonated his explosives, the interior ministry said.
“I will take revenge against the culprits”, he said.
The organizers could not be immediately contacted for comment on Chakhansuri’s statement.
Mohammad Ismail Kawousi, a spokesman for the ministry of public health, said at least 29 dead and 142 wounded had been taken to nearby hospitals but the numbers may change.
President Ashraf Ghani vowed to punish those responsible for the terrorist attack.
About 9,800 USA troops are in Afghanistan.
But several Hazara political and intellectual figures said they were concerned that the Ghani government would not be able to protect them, and some suggested that Saturday’s attack was abetted by collaborators inside the government.
The UN mission in Afghanistan described the attack as a “war crime”. The United States Embassy in Kabul also condemned the attack.
The rights group Amnesty International said the “horrific attack … demonstrates the utter disregard that armed groups have for human life”.
“We were holding a peaceful demonstration when I heard a bang and then everyone was escaping and yelling”, said Sabira Jan, a protester who witnessed the attack and saw bloodied bodies strewn across the ground.
Hazara leaders in the ethnically divided nation lashed out at the Pashtun president, calling the decision prejudiced against their community, which has suffered a long history of oppression.
The demonstrators had been shouting “death to discrimination” and “all Afghans are equal”.
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The transmission line, meant to provide secure electricity to 10 provinces, is part of the so-called TUTAP project backed by the Asia Development Bank, linking energy-rich states of Central Asia with Afghanistan and Pakistan.
