One person from the Sikh community was killed in an attack on a Sikh temple in the Afghan capital, Kabul, on Saturday. Seven others were injured. That is what the Ministry of the Interior says.
The facts took place around 6:30 a.m. local time, a time when worshipers customarily pray in the temple. Gunmen broke into the Sikh temple, which lies to the west of the city. A guard attacked them with a grenade, Interior Ministry spokesman Abdul Nafi Takor said in a press release.
Taliban fighters would then have intervened. One of them was also killed, the spokesman said. During the intervention, “two perpetrators were killed” by the Taliban. A few minutes after the attack, a car bomb exploded near the temple, causing no casualties.
India
Indian Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar tweeted condemning Saturday’s “cowardly attack”. A few days ago, an Indian delegation visited Kabul to discuss humanitarian aid with the Taliban government. The possibility of reopening the Indian embassy in Kabul was also discussed. The embassy has been closed since the Taliban took power.
About 200 Sikhs live in Muslim-dominated Afghanistan. In the 1970s there were half a million. In recent years, the Afghan Sikh community has been the victim of frequent attacks. The deadliest was in March 2020, when a temple was also attacked in Kabul. At least 25 people were killed then. The attack was claimed by the Islamist terrorist group IS.
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