Mon 29 July 2019:
At least 20 people were killed and 50 injured in Afghanistan’s capital Kabul on Sunday in a suicide bombing and gun battle at vice-presidential candidate Amrullah Saleh’s office, the government said in a statement on Monday.
The attack on the office of President Ashraf Ghani’s pick for vice president in the forthcoming election, Amrullah Saleh — a former intelligence chief, began last evening with a suicide car bombing. It was declared over around midnight with all four attackers killed.
Saleh, a staunch critic of Pakistan and the Taliban, was in office at the time of the attack but escaped unhurt with minor bruises. Interior Ministry spokesman Nusrat Rahimi told Anadolu Agency that 20 people including 16 civilians and four guards of Saleh were killed and at least 50 others wounded. There has been no claim of responsibility for the attack.
Ghani, the U.N., EU and several countries condemned the attack. This came as the official election campaign began on Sunday for the landmark presidential polls in Afghanistan, with Ghani and 17 other candidates running for the top post.
