On Wednesday, a suicide bombing in Kabul killed the Taliban’s refugee minister, according to the media reports.
The explosion, which occurred inside the ministry, killed Khalil Haqqani, the Taliban’s refugee minister, according to officials. He is the most high-profile casualty of a bombing in Afghanistan since the Taliban returned to power three years ago. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the blast.
Khalil Haqqani, the uncle of Sirajuddin Haqqani, leads a powerful faction within the Taliban. Haqqani was the brother of Jalaluddin Haqqani, the founder of the feared Haqqani network that was responsible for some of the most violent attacks during the Taliban’s two-decade insurgency following the U.S.-led 2001 invasion to topple the group’s previous government.
He was also the uncle of Sirajuddin Haqqani, who is presently serving as Afghanistan’s interior minister. Violence has generally reduced in Afghanistan since the Taliban stormed back into power in the summer of 2021, when U.S. and allied NATO forces pulled out in a chaotic withdrawal that remains the subject of intense scrutiny in Washington.
The regional branch of the ISIS terror group, however, ISIS-Khorasan, has remained active in Afghanistan and regularly targets both Taliban regime officials and civilians and foreign nationals. Their attacks are seen largely as an effort to undermine the Taliban’s rule.
The Taliban officials said investigations were underway to determine who carried out the Wednesday attack that killed Haqqani, whom they said may have been the target of the blast, and to confirm how many others died in the explosion.
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