62 killed in Kandahar mosque suicide attack

KANDAHAR: A suicide bomber attacked a Shiite mosque in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar during Friday prayers, Taliban officials said, killing at least 62 people and injuring 74 others. The assault came just a week after a suicide attack on worshippers at a mosque in the northern city of Kunduz, which was claimed by the Islamic State group.

There has not yet been any claim of responsibility for the assault in Kandahar, the spiritual heartland of the Taliban.

"Our initial information shows it was a suicide bomber who blew up himself up inside the mosque. We have launched an investigation to find out more," a local Taliban official said.

A doctor at the city’s central Mirwais hospital said: "Forty one bodies and 74 wounded people have been brought to our hospital so far." Other medical sources and a provincial official confirmed a toll of more than 60, and at least 15 ambulances were rushing to and from the scene.

"We are overwhelmed," the doctor said. An eyewitness said he heard three explosions, one at the main door of the mosque, another at a southern area, and a third where worshippers wash before their prayers.

"We are saddened to learn that an explosion took place in a mosque of the Shiite brotherhood in the first district of Kandahar city in which a number of our compatriots were martyred and wounded," tweeted interior ministry spokesman Qari Sayed Khosti, of the Taliban movement that rules Afghanistan.