Two bombs struck Afghan cities yesterday, killing a civilian and wounding eight more people, authorities said, in the latest attacks linked to the Taliban insurgency.
In one blast, a bomb hidden in a wheelbarrow was remotely detonated to explode near a police vehicle in Kandahar, killing one person and wounding four others, the interior ministry said in a statement.
The second blast was in the music section of a market in the eastern town of Khost, a recent target of several attacks claimed by the Taliban.
There were no claims of responsibility for yesterday’s attacks but they were similar to scores carried out by Taliban insurgents in their campaign against the government.
On Saturday, the military said troops killed 60 militants and seized then destroyed their biggest drugs haul in a four-day operation in Helmand Province that smashed an insurgent hub in the south.
Precision air strikes obliterated 92 tonnes of drugs and masses of heroin-processing chemicals and bomb-making materials collected in the sweep of Marja.
“A total of 60 militants were eliminated as they mounted an ineffective and uncoordinated defense against friendly forces,” a joint US and Afghan military statement said, issuing a final tally for the whole operation.
The statement said the troops had “seized the single largest drug cache by Afghan-led forces in Afghanistan to date.”
Helmand is the main producer of Afghan opium, which accounts for more than 90 percent of the world’s supply.
The operation had confirmed that Marja was a “hub of multiple types of militant and criminal activity,” the statement said.
“The four-day operation severely disrupted one of the key militant and criminal operations and narcotics hubs in southern Afghanistan,” US military spokesman Colonel Greg Julian said.
Afghan and international officials say the Taliban earn millions of dollars a year from the drugs trade.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
A top Vietnamese property tycoon was on Thursday sentenced to death in one of the biggest corruption cases in history, with an estimated US$27 billion in damages. A panel of three hand-picked jurors and two judges rejected all defense arguments by Truong My Lan, chair of major developer Van Thinh Phat, who was found guilty of swindling cash from Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB) over a decade. “The defendant’s actions ... eroded people’s trust in the leadership of the [Communist] Party and state,” read the verdict at the trial in Ho Chi Minh City. After the five-week trial, 85 others were also sentenced on
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of