Taliban Claim Attack on Afghanistan Defense Minister’s Home

KABUL—The Taliban claimed accountability for a complex suicide assault focusing on the residence of Afghanistan’s protection minister that killed eight folks and wounded 20, a person of the most severe insurgent strikes in the Afghan capital in modern months.

Gen. Bismillah Khan Mohammadi, who took about as minister of protection right after the Taliban swept by northern Afghanistan in June, was not at residence during Tuesday night’s assault. The ensuing gunbattle amongst Afghan exclusive forces and Taliban fighters rattled downtown Kabul for several hours.

The assault arrived as the Taliban have been urgent into provincial capitals all over the place. Although the Taliban have fought their way into some of these cities, such as Helmand’s capital of Lashkar Gah, they have been stemmed by weighty U.S. airstrikes and by Afghan exclusive forces flown in as reinforcements.

In a statement launched Wednesday, the Taliban termed the assault on Gen. Mohammadi’s heavily fortified residence “the commencing of retaliatory functions in opposition to the core officials of the Kabul administration.”

Gen. Mohammadi is a previous mujahedeen commander with a lengthy document of combating the Taliban. Hrs right after Tuesday’s blast, Gen. Mohammadi appeared in a movie message confirming that several of his bodyguards experienced been wounded. “With the mercy of God, neither me nor my household users were damage in this assault,” Gen. Mohammadi said. “I guarantee you all, my countrymen, that such incidents will not disrupt my will and morale in defending you and my place.”