Afghanistan continues to remain a land of terror where blood of the innocents is shed every now and then. No one knows when it will be his/her turn and everyone lives in a state of complete fear in every corner of this country. Whether it is the highly fortified city of Kabul or the most remote district of Afghanistan, waves of terror are not confined to any particular region, area or town. If last month it was Kunar province’s turn where 21 Afghan soldiers were slain by Taliban on Tuesday it was the turn of people living in northwest Faryab province where a suicide bombing claimed lives of at least 15 Afghan civilians and injured 27 others.
According to the Faryab provincial governor Mohammad Allah Baktash the suicide bomber riding an explosive-laden Rickshaw blew himself up among civilians in the morning rush hours. Although no group has claimed responsibility for the attack, the Taliban have been involved in such attacks over the past decade.
The incident takes place at times when Afghanistan is only three days away from celebrating the beginning of the new solar year or Nawroz 1393. The Taliban have been opposing the centuries-old Nawroz celebration deeming it against the teaching of Islam. Undoubtedly, the whole nation is saddened over the Faryab incident.
In a statement released by the presidential office, as usual President Hamid Karzai has strongly condemned the bloody incident calling it an act of enemies of Afghanistan instead of clearly mentioning who the enemies are. "Those behind such crimes against humanity are mercenaries working to materialize the malicious designs of foreigners by killing Muslims and conspiring to make Afghanistan insecure," President Karzai said in the statement.
The Afghan government has kept a soft instance towards the Taliban and the President has even been referring them as ‘angry brothers’ since long. Hundreds, if not thousands of Taliban prisoners have been released by the government from various prisons in Afghanistan including Bagram detention center over the past few months. All such steps and instances of the government have been for nudging the Taliban into peace talks. Nevertheless, in response to sympathies from Karzai administration, they always come up with violent attacks such as that in Faryab.
The Taliban have threatened the people not to participate in the upcoming election which is scheduled for April 5th. As the election day nears, it is feared the insurgents would launch more deadly attacks on the Afghan civilians to bar them from voting. The connection between Faryab incident and election cannot be rejected.