Twin blasts in Afghan capital kill at least 26, including nine journalists

'VERY DANGEROUS' WORKING ENVIRONMENT

Afghanistan was already considered one of the most dangerous countries in the world for journalists, with at least 20 killed last year. Last week, unidentified gunmen shot a journalist in the southern city of Kandahar.

In a separate incident, Ahmad Shah, a journalist who worked for a local language service of the BBC and for Reuters, was shot dead in the eastern province of Khost, officials said.

His death was confirmed by the BBC but there was no indication of any connection with the Kabul attack, the most serious on the Afghan media since 2016, when seven workers for Tolo News were killed in an attack claimed by the Taliban.

Eight of the journalists were from Afghan outlets: two reporters from the Mashal TV, a cameraman and a reporter working for 1TV, three reporters from Radio Azadi and one from Tolo News, the AFJSC said.

The French news agency Agence France-Presse said its chief photographer in Afghanistan, Shah Marai, was killed.

A Reuters photographer was slightly hurt by shrapnel.

"Journalists were doing their job when a suicide bomber killed them, such attacks prove that the working environment is very dangerous now," said Rahimullah Samandar, a senior member of the AFJSC.

The reporters had arrived to cover the initial blast in the Shashdarak area close to buildings of the National Directorate of Security (NDS) intelligence service and near to the U.S. embassy.

Held back by police, they were waiting some distance away near the Ministry of Urban Development and Housing, when the second explosion went off just as people were entering the government office.

Hundreds of people have been killed and wounded in a series of attacks in Kabul since the beginning of the year, despite President Ashraf Ghani's offer in February for peace talks "without preconditions".

In the southern city of Kandahar, where NATO-led forces operate out of a big air base, 11 children were killed and 16 wounded when a suicide bomber drove his explosive-laden van into a foreign-force convoy, police said.

The 11 children who were killed were studying in a nearby madrassa, or religious school, said Matiullah Zhman, a spokesman for Kandahar police. In addition eight members of the NATO-led Resolute Support coalition were wounded, the force said.  

Reuters