Yet another suicide bomber has struck Kabul, killing one policeman and injuring four. The Taliban has claimed responsibility for the attack on Northgate Hotel occupied mostly by foreigners. Kabul is still reeling from the suicide bombing that hit a peaceful rally by the minority ethnic Hazara community on July 23. More than 80 people were killed and hundreds wounded in the attack claimed by Daesh (the self-proclaimed Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant).
Like Iraq and Syria, Afghanistan has been plagued by brutal violence, but the death toll has been reduced to a statistic. The face of human suffering is all but forgotten.
More than 30 people were killed and 300 injured in April in a Taliban suicide attack on the headquarters of a military unit in central Kabul. A massive explosion in the Shah Shaheed area in August last year killed 15, with hundreds wounded. In May last year, the Taliban had attacked the Park Palace guesthouse in central Kabul, killing 14 people. These are but some of the attacks that tell us a story of an Afghanistan that is suffering. Racked by violence, the people live in constant fear of being stalked by death. First, there was the Taliban and now they have to contend with Daesh too.
The Taliban is re-grouping, with their new leader Mullah Haibatullah Akhundzada promising to follow the footsteps of its founder Mullah Omar and spreading violence, rather than talking to the Afghan government and bringing peace to the land. Hundreds of lives have been lost and thousands have been injured, tortured and displaced. There seems to be no end to the terror. The international community must rally around the Afghan government and bring peace back to Afghanistan. This deadly cycle must be stopped.
