Suicide car bombing near Afghan bank kills 29, mostly civilians

Reporting from KANDAHAR, Afghanistan —  A huge suicide car bombing struck Thursday outside a bank in Afghanistan’s southern Helmand province, targeting Afghan troops and government employees waiting to collect their salaries ahead of a major Muslim holiday and killing at least 29 people, officials said.

Hayatullah Hayat, the provincial governor in Helmand, said most of the casualties were civilians. The explosion near the Kabul Bank in the provincial capital of Lashkar Gah also wounded at least 60 people, he said.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack but Helmand has been at the center of bitter battles between the Taliban and Afghan security forces, aided by NATO troops. The insurgents, believed to control nearly 80% of the province’s countryside, have increasingly been pressing into Lashkar Gah and its environs in efforts to take the city.

In recent weeks, the Taliban have overrun Helmand’s key Sangin district, where both British and U.S. troops had fought for years to keep them at bay.

The attack happened as scores of people, many of them Afghan soldiers or civil servants, were waiting near the Kabul Bank to collect their salaries ahead of the Eid holiday, which follows the holy month of Ramadan, which is expected to end later this weekend.

Esmatullah, an Afghan border policeman who was at the scene of the explosion, said the blast was deafening. He said many were missing in the ensuing chaos as witnesses, survivors and ambulances struggled to ferry the most seriously wounded to hospital.

“We are taking children to the hospital,” said Esmatullah, who like many Afghans uses only one name.

Twelve-year-old Hosnia was crying outside the bank as she searched for her father, who had brought her to buy shoes ahead of the Muslim holiday.

“I couldn’t find anyone, my brother and my father,” she said. “My father told me he will take me to buy shoes. We came here and then there was the explosion.”

Helmand is considered a key region because it is one of the largest opium producing provinces for the Taliban, who charge opium traffickers a hefty tax to move their contraband to market. Corrupt government officials also benefit from the production and trade of opium, the raw material used to make heroin.

Afghanistan is the world’s largest opium-producing country, producing more than all other opium-producing countries combined, according to a United Nations estimate.

Meanwhile, a militant attack the previous night inside a mosque in the country’s east killed two members of the local council.

Salim Sallhe, spokesman for the provincial governor in eastern Logar, said gunmen opened fire at worshipers during prayers at a mosque in Baraki district on Wednesday night. Two other local officials were wounded by the gunfire.

Sallhe said police were investigating. No group claimed responsibility for the attack, but Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid denied the insurgents were behind the shooting.

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