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62 killed, 68 injured as blast hits Afghan mosque in Kandahar-UPDATED-1

15 October 2021 17:11 (UTC +04:00)

A large explosion tore through a Shi'ite mosque in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar during Friday prayers, killing at least 62 people and wounding 68, officials said, the second massive attack in a week targeting worshippers from the minority sect, APA reports citing Jakarta Post.

A local reporter in Kandahar told Reuters that eyewitnesses had described three suicide attackers, one of whom blew himself up at the entrance to the mosque with the two others detonating their devices inside the building.

"The situation is very bad. Mirwais hospital is messaging and calling on young people to give blood," he said, referring to a local hospital where dead and injured had been taken.

***14:15

A blast in a Shia mosque in Afghanistan’s Kandahar killed at least 30 people and injured at least 20 others on Friday, a source in a local hospital said, APA reports citing Sputnik.

According to reports, the explosion was staged by a suicide attacker.

Earlier in the day, an eyewitness told Sputnik that at least 7 people were killed following the explosion.

***14:00

A large explosion tore through a Shi'ite mosque in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar during Friday prayers, causing heavy casualties, a spokesman of the Taliban government's interior ministry said, APA reports citing France 24.

Qari Saeed Khosti said authorities were collecting details of the explosion, which took place days after a suicide bomb attack claimed by Islamic State on a Shi'ite mosque in the northern city of Kunduz that killed scores of people.

Photographs posted by journalists on social media showed many people apparently dead or seriously wounded on the floor of the mosque.

Nematullah Wafa, a former member of the provincial council, said the blast occurred at the Imam Bargah mosque and caused heavy casualties but there were no immediate confirmation of the number of dead and wounded.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility.

The blast, coming so soon after the Kunduz attack underlined the increasingly uncertain security in Afghanistan as the Islamic State group has stepped up operations following the Taliban victory over the Western-backed government in Kabul in August.