Toll rises to 69 in Kabul attack

The death toll in the suicide attack on a voter registration centre in the Afghan capital here on Sunday increased to 69 and the number of injured to 120, police said on Tuesday.

The toll increased as some of the bodies were taken directly to their homes and not to the hospitals. Thus the authorities could not immediately count them, Efe news quoted a police spokesman as saying.

On Sunday, the official tally of victims in the attack stood at 57 dead and 119 wounded.

Among the dead were 27 women and two police officers, with the bodies of the latter initially being taken to police hospitals, delaying their inclusion in the overall tally.

The spokesman said that about half of the injured were women and five police officers were wounded.

The attack took place at around 10 a.m. in the Qala-e-Nazir area when a suicide bomber detonated his explosives among the crowd as people queued to register themselves at the poll centre.

The voter registration centre is situated in a district with a large population of the Shia minority Hazara community, often targeted by the Islamic State (IS) terror group.

Taliban spokesperson Zabiullah Mujahid had denied responsibility of the attack on Twitter.

The process of registering voters for October's elections began last week in Kabul and is set to continue in the coming weeks.

--IANS

and/in