2017-03-08 18:34:07
Almost 40 people died this Wednesday in an attack on Afghanistan’s main military hospital, in Kabul, attacked for six hours by the command of jihadists from the Islamic State group disguised as doctors.
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According to the spokesman for the Ministry of Defense, General Daud Waziri, Most of the victims, including about 50 injured, “were patients, doctors and nurses.” The general reported that “at least 30 people have died and about 50 have been injured”. but the hospital of the Italian NGO Pajawiri, which specializes in war surgery and which is not the closest to the site of the attack, said about “38 dead and 70 wounded.”
The Islamic State (IS) jihadist group claimed responsibility for the attack through the encrypted messaging service Telegram.
“Islamic State infiltrators attacked a military hospital in Kabul,” said IS, while the Afghan Taliban denied any immediate involvement via Twitter. But sources from the security services told AFP they were skeptical, both of the denial and of IS’s claim.
Hospital, with capacity for 400 patients, He was attacked by four armed men, dressed as doctors, all killed by security. Around 09:00 local time, the first explosion was felt, triggered by a suicide at the back door of the hospital, thus opening the doors to the order.
Television footage showed civilians, some dressed in white, fleeing to the roof of the building, while others sought shelter in hallways and windows.
“Sardar Daud Khan hospital is under attack. We know that many assassins dressed in medical clothes entered it with AK-47 and grenades,” the spokesman of the General Defense Ministry Daulat announced in the morning.
‘I jumped out the window’
“I was on the third floor: the killers wearing white medical clothes managed to force through the back door. When the shooting started I ran through the streets. everything was moving,” one among doctors told AFP, requesting anonymity.
“I took refuge in the renaissance and when I saw that there was no escape, I jumped out of the window.”he added, specifying that he broke his leg when he fell.
Shots, explosions and grenades, as well as ambulance sirens do not stop sounding all morning. There was at least one explosion from a car bomb that exploded without leaving casualties in the hospital parking lot, according to a defense spokesman.
A nurse, Abdul Qadeer, confessed his fear to AFP in front of the hospital: “I was in the locker room when I saw a man dressed as a doctor shooting with an AK-47 at the guards and patients on the floor third. managed to escape by climbing the barbed wire, but my friend was beaten.
“I was preparing my patients for an intervention when I saw three armed men who dressed as doctors entered the back door,” a doctor told the Tolo television channel live. “They shot me, but I managed to escape,” said this surgeon.
‘We will never forgive these criminals’
The hospital is famous for treating both members of the security forces and rebels. The Prime Minister, Abdullah Abdullah, He promised to “not forgive these criminals.”
This attack occurred a week after two suicide attacks on March 1, claimed by the Taliban, against two compounds of the security services in Kabul – the police and intelligence (NDS) -, which caused the death of 16 and more than a hundred were injured.
On Tuesday afternoon, terrorists fired two rockets in the same area at the US embassy in Kabul, according to Western sources.
Western government offices located in the residential area of Wazir Ajbar Khan, a few hundred meters from the hospital that was hit, are on alert this Thursday.
The last major attack against an Afghan hospital dates back to June 2011: 38 people, including women and infants in the maternity ward, were killed in a suicide car attack in Logar district. , 75 km south of Kabul. The Taliban later denied any involvement in the attack and condemned it.
AFP
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