A suicide attacker on a motorbike set off a deadly explosion near a bus carrying media professionals Wednesday in the heart of Afghanistan’s capital, officials said.
Six civilians, including four women, died, and at least 24 others were wounded in the Kabul blast, said Afghan Deputy Interior Minister Mohammad Ayoub Salangi.
The bomber targeted a bus carrying staff members from Afghan broadcaster Tolo TV and video production company Kaboora Productions, Afghan Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah said.
“Murdering those who work to enlighten, educate, and entertain will not stop Afghans from exercising their universal human right to freedom of expression,” the U.S. Embassy in Kabul said in a statement condemning the attack. “A vibrant media is one of the great successes of the Afghan people over the past 14 years.”
Afghanistan’s parliament building and the Russian Embassy are on the road where the blast occurred. But it was not immediately clear if the attack killed or injured any Afghan public officials or foreign diplomats.
The Taliban claim responsibility for the bombing, wrote Zabihullah Mujahid, a spokesman for the Taliban’s self-declared Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, via email. He accused Tolo TV of being part of the West’s intelligence network.
Its purported involvement in Wednesday’s attack isn’t a major surprise, given the Taliban’s longstanding and violent opposition to free expression and other rights. The group issued a threat against the independent Tolo TV network last year.
Taliban one of many violent forces in Afghanistan
The Taliban has been battling the Afghan government and its foreign allies since being ousted from power after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States.
Yet it is hardly the only group responsible for recent violence in Afghanistan.
Under its late leader Osama bin Laden, al Qaeda long called the mountainous Asian nation its home, and it continues to have a presence there.
And more and more, ISIS is making its own presence felt.
That group emerged in Iraq and Syria, where it holds swaths of territory as part of what it calls its Islamic State caliphate, but has carried out or inspired attacks in many other places around the world as well.
The relatively poor, war-torn nation of Afghanistan has been one such locale, with President Ashraf Ghani warning the U.S. Congress last March about the “terrible threat” the group poses to his country and its neighbors.
Gen. John Campbell, the commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, told Congress last fall that between 1,000 and 3,000 active ISIS members were in Afghanistan. Many of these new recruits are disaffected Taliban, a fact that may have played into Russia’s recent decision to share intelligence pertinent to fighting ISIS with the Taliban, its historic foe.