Karzai Seeks to Discuss Attacks on Shiites With Pakistan
President Hamid Karzai paid an emotional visit on Wednesday to a hospital full of survivors of a series of suicide bombings claimed by a Pakistani extremist group, and he promised to pursue the issue with Pakistan’s government.
Mr. Karzai, however, stopped short of accusing Pakistan of involvement in the suicide attacks, which killed about 60 people — including at least a few infants — and wounded more than 200, most of them in Kabul. One of the dead in Kabul was an American man, according to the Public Health Ministry. The American Embassy confirmed that, but it declined to identify the victim.
On Tuesday, the militant group Lashkar-e-Jhangvi claimed responsibility for the three bombings, in Kabul, Mazar-i-Sharif and Kandahar. All were directed against Shiite worshipers on the holiest day in their calendar, commemorating the death in 680 of Imam Hussein, the grandson of the Prophet Muhammad.
The group has mounted many sectarian attacks against Shiites in Pakistan, and has ties to the Taliban and Al Qaeda. Many experts also say it has ties to the Pakistani government’s top spy agency, Inter-Services Intelligence, or ISI.
“Certainly we will discuss this issue with the government of Pakistan and we will talk to them, this issue is extremely serious and important to us,” Mr. Karzai said in a brief news conference after he toured the Italian Emergency Hospital, where many of the most seriously wounded were taken.
“This is the first time we have seen such an act on such an important religious day, and there is no doubt that this just shows hatred for the people of Afghanistan and contempt for Islam,” Mr. Karzai said.