Gunmen have stormed a Sikh temple in the Afghan capital, killing at least one community member and wounding seven others, the Interior Ministry said.
Ministry spokesman Abdul Nafi Takor said the attackers used at least one grenade during Saturday’s attack and set the complex on fire. Minutes later, he detonated a car bomb in the area but caused no casualties, he added.
“One of our Sikh brothers has been killed and seven others [were] injured in the attack, “Takor said in a statement.
Two of the attackers were killed in an operation to protect the temple after the attack, he said, and a Taliban fighter was also killed.
The number of attacks has dropped nationwide since the Taliban took power in August, but there have been several deadly attacks in recent months.
“I heard gunfire and explosions from the gurdwara,” said Gurnam Singh, a leader of the Sikh community.
Singh, who was close to the scene, said the death toll could rise. “Usually at this time of morning we have several Sikh devotees who come to offer prayers at the gurdwara,” he said.
Images posted on social media after the attack showed broken pillars and walls in the temple’s main prayer hall, with remains scattered on the ground. A section of a building near the temple also caught fire, an Agence France-Presse correspondent from the area reported.
The windows of several apartment buildings were shattered by the impact of the car bomb, and the nearby streets were filled with broken glass. Taliban forces cordoned off the neighborhood, preventing reporters from speaking to residents or witnesses.
A Taliban fighter deployed in the area said some Sikhs in the temple at the time of the attack managed to escape through a back door.
Some of Kabul’s other Sikh temples were closed for security reasons as reports of the attack spread.
No group has so far claimed responsibility for the beating.
The attack came days after an Indian delegation visited Kabul to discuss the distribution of humanitarian aid from India to Afghanistan.
Afghan and Indian media said the delegation also discussed with Taliban officials the possibility of reopening the Indian embassy.
New Delhi, which had close ties to the previous US-backed Afghan government, closed its mission in Kabul and evacuated all its diplomatic and other personnel when the Taliban seized power in Afghanistan on 15 December. August last year.
Indian Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar condemned Saturday’s “cowardly attack” on the temple.
The number of Sikhs living in Afghanistan has dropped to about 200, compared with half a million in the 1970s.
The community has been repeatedly attacked. In March 2020, at least 25 people were killed when gunmen stormed a temple.
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Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attack, which forced many Sikhs to leave the country even before the Taliban returned to power.
The jihadist group has a history of targets against Afghan Sikhs, Hindus, and members of other minority communities, such as Shiite Muslims and Sufis.
He claimed responsibility for a series of attacks during Ramadan, which ended in Afghanistan on April 30.
The deadliest was in the northern city of Kunduz, where a bomb aimed at the Sufi faithful killed at least 36 people in a mosque.
Like the Taliban, Islamic State is a Sunni Islamist group, but the two are bitter rivals.
The Taliban have pursued an Afghanistan free of foreign forces, while Islamic State wants a caliphate that extends from Turkey to Pakistan and beyond. Taliban officials insist their forces have defeated the group, but analysts say it remains a key security challenge.