Suicide bomber targets Shiite mosque in Kabul, killing 32

A suicide bomber struck a Shiite mosque in the Afghan capital on Monday, killing 32 people, the UN office said, the second large-scale attack targeting minority Shiites in Kabul in just over a month.

Afghan police said the bomber, who was on foot, had walked into the Shiite mosque in western Kabul where he detonated his explosives among the crowd of worshippers.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, though Sunni extremists such as the Taliban and the Islamic State militants, who view Shiites as heretics and apostates, frequently target Shiite mosques and public gatherings.

The United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan said the explosion also wounded more than 50 people, many of them children. Earlier in the day, the Afghan authorities said at least 28 people were killed and 48 wounded.

"This appalling attack on worshippers is an atrocity," the statement quoted Pernille Kardel, the Secretary-General's Deputy Special Representative for Afghanistan. "UNAMA expresses its revulsion at this latest effort by extremists to stoke sectarian violence in Afghanistan."

Today's bombing hit during a prayer ceremony commemorating 40 days since the anniversary of the death of Imam Hussein, the slain grandson of Prophet Mohammed. The ceremony is known as Arbaeen, meaning 'forty' in Arabic. Hussein is a revered Shiite martyr who was killed in 680 AD in the city of Karbala in present-day Iraq.

In early October, militants attacked another Shiite ceremony at a shrine in Kabul, commemorating the anniversary of Hussein's actual death. That attack killed 17 people, mostly worshippers but also several policemen. A day later, a similar attack struck Shiites in the city of Mazer-e Sharif in northern Balkh province, killing at least 14 people.

The Islamic State affiliate in Afghanistan claimed responsibility for one of those two attacks, the UN statement said.

Faredoon Obiadi, head of the Criminal Investigation Department, Kabul police, said the attacker in today's bombing walked into the Baqir-ul Ulom mosque during prayers. He mingled with the crowd on the first floor of the two-storey building where he detonated his explosives, Obiadi said.

"Suddenly, a huge explosion happened, then everything went dark," said Nawaz Ali, 50, who was inside the mosque but suffered only minor wounds.

Kardel from UNAMA added in her statement that "religious and ethnic tolerance values the Afghan people hold strongly".

"I urge the Afghan authorities to do everything possible to defend Afghans of all faiths," she added.