BFF-43 Kabul students pick through debris after deadly blast

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Kabul students pick through debris after deadly blast

KABUL, July 2, 2019 (BSS/AFP) – Kabul students picked through the debris of
shattered schools on Tuesday looking for books, backpacks and other
possessions, a day after a massive bomb ripped through the Afghan capital.

Five schools were damaged in Monday’s attack which targeted a defence
ministry building, but also shredded a mosque and a TV station.

At least six people were killed in the Taliban attack, including one child
and two special forces soldiers, the interior ministry said.

The bombing — and an ensuing shootout — wounded scores of people
including 50 children, most of whom were hurt by flying glass.

“The schools in the area have been badly damaged,” said local resident
Ahmad Seyar. “It is a disaster.”

At one private high school in the middle-class part of town near the city
centre, children were allowed to return to try to retrieve whatever they
could from the rubble-filled building.

One girl showed AFP cuts on her arm from glass as the school windows
shattered from the force of the blast.

Some social media images purportedly taken at a hospital showed wounded,
stunned children in school uniforms, still clutching books as they arrived
for treatment.

– All windows broken –

Save the Children branded the attack “utterly deplorable”, warning that
“children’s smaller bodies sustain more serious injuries than adults” and
that the trauma of such attacks can stay with them for years.

Monday’s bombing was followed by Taliban gunmen storming a nearby
building, trigging a gunbattle with special forces.

Atiqullah, a resident from a nearby apartment building, said the bomb had
broken all the windows in his home.

“The blast was huge,” he told AFP.

“Two of my family members were slightly injured. Our home is badly
damaged.”

Another resident, Hamidullah, said “dust, dirt, blood and human bodies
were everywhere”.

Kabul had enjoyed something of a lull in violence over the winter, but in
recent months it has seen a string of sophisticated attacks, including one
against an American non-governmental group in May.

The UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) said Monday’s attack
showed a “reckless disregard” for civilian lives.

“I have been deeply saddened by reports of many wounded children there,
along with the photos of students still clutching their schoolbooks as they
are moved into ambulances,” UNAMA head Tadamichi Yamamoto said.

The US and the Taliban are currently holding peace talks to try to forge a
deal that would end America’s longest war, but even as the two sides meet,
violence continues across Afghanistan.

Monday’s “indiscriminate assault, which caused injuries to children at
school, was particularly barbarous,” US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said
in a statement.

“It serves as a stark reminder of what is at stake in the peace process”.

BSS/AFP/RY/1931 hrs