“The Voice of America” reported on 24 February that a series of suicide bombings and militant raids in Afghanistan swept Afghanistan a day after construction work on the much-awaited Afghan section of an international gas pipeline, which will supply Turkmen gas to consumers in Pakistan and India, began.
An Afghan Interior Ministry spokesman said a suicide bomber Saturday blew himself up near a security post in Kabul, killing at least three people and wounding several others. The Islamic State terrorist group took responsibility for the attack.
Afghanistan’s officials said the deadliest of the several attacks occurred in western Farah province, where Taliban insurgents in a pre-dawn assault killed at least 20 government forces. Separately, two early morning suicide bombings targeted Afghan forces in the Helmand province.
Visiting U.S. permanent representative to NATO, Kay Bailey Hutchison, while speaking to reporters in Kabul, condemned what she said was a “fruitless” effort by the Taliban and called on the insurgents to join an Afghan peace process.
Farah and Helmand are among the provinces located on the route of a regional pipeline being constructed to transport natural gas from Turkmenistan through Afghanistan to Pakistan and India. The multi-billion dollar project, known as TAPI, is expected to be fully operational within next two years.
Afghan President Ashraf Ghani who on Friday hosted leaders from the participating nations in the western border city of Herat where they jointly inaugurated construction work on the portion of the pipeline passing through Afghanistan, condemned the violence and assured that this will not stop the Afghan authorities to implement the social and economic project which is of important for the country.
Let us recall that on 23 February President of Turkmenistan Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov and President of Afghanistan Ashraf Ghani took part in the festive events which were held on the territories of both countries on the occasion of the groundbreaking ceremony of the Afghan section of the TAPI project.