By Hawa Mahmoodi<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At 1 pm on October 8, when worshipers gathered for Friday prayer, an explosion took place inside the Sayedabad Mosque in Khan Abad district of Kunduz province in northern Afghanistan, killing at least 50 people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Taliban spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahid confirmed on his Twitter that it was a suicide attack carried out by a \u201cTakfiri insurgent.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Daesh or the Islamic State-Khorasan (ISIS-K) has taken responsibility for the attack, claiming to have targeted the central Shiite-Hazaras\u2019 mosque in Kunduz province. Since its establishment in 2015, the Afghan branch of the Islamic State has regularly targeted Hazaras, an ethnic and Shiite minority in Afghanistan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The exact number of causalities is not confirmed yet. On Friday a doctor at the M\u00e9decins Sans Fronti\u00e8res (MSF) hospital in Kunduz province told Rakhshana Media that more than 50 people have been killed and more than 100 were injured in the explosion. However, MSF tweeted that \u201c90 wounded and 20 dead\u201d have been transferred to their hospital in Kunduz.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A doctor who works in one of the hospitals in Kunduz, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Rukhshana Media that more than 350 people had been killed and wounded who have been transferred to several hospitals, including MSF and Kunduz provincial Hospital.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A local source told Rukhshana Media that since some of the families have taken the bodies of their loved one\u2019s home, providing the accurate number of causalities, seems difficult. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The source who does not want his name to be mentioned due to security threats, said victims include children and youth. \u201cSome of those who have been killed were doctors, engineers, and former government employees,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He confirmed that the mosque was the largest Shiite mosque in Kunduz province.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cSome of the bodies were buried in a mass grave,\u201d said the source, \u201cbecause they couldn\u2019t be identified.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Last night, I was in a mosque helping with burial of victims, people brought hands and feet of a victim that didn\u2019t match the body,\u201d a local resident of Khan Abad told Rukhshana Media, \u201cAlso, there was a body that no one could identify.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) called the mosque attack a \u201ctargeted attack on a persecuted minority\u201d and called for the protection of Hazaras, in a tweet posted on October 8.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC) also condemned the attack, calling it \u201ca crime in the continued systematic killings of Shiites and Hazaras in the country.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Seyedabad Mosque has a capacity of about 500 people at a time. On the day the mosque was targeted by ISIS suicide bombers, about 400 people gathered for Friday prayers, according to a local source.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Local residents told Rukhshana Media that the Taliban have disarmed the guards who were in charge of mosques\u2019 security.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By Hawa Mahmoodi At 1 pm on October 8, when worshipers gathered for Friday prayer, an explosion took place inside the Sayedabad Mosque in Khan Abad district of Kunduz province in northern Afghanistan, killing at least 50 people. The Taliban spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahid confirmed on his Twitter that it was a suicide attack carried out […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3922,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"subtitle":"","format":"standard","video":"","gallery":"","source_name":"","source_url":"","via_name":"","via_url":"","override":[{"single_blog_custom":"","sidebar":"","second_sidebar":"","share_position":"","share_float_style":"","post_date_format":"","post_date_format_custom":"","post_reading_time_wpm":"","zoom_button_out_step":"1","zoom_button_in_step":"1","number_popup_post":"1"}],"image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"","single_post_gallery_size":""}],"trending_post_position":"","trending_post_label":"","sponsored_post_label":"","sponsored_post_name":"","sponsored_post_url":"","sponsored_post_logo":"","sponsored_post_desc":""},"jnews_primary_category":{"id":""},"jnews_override_counter":{"view_counter_number":"0","share_counter_number":"0","like_counter_number":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1022,966,902],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3933","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cases-en","category-featured-en","category-reports-en"],"yoast_head":"\n