A Japanese doctor whose long career was dedicated to helping some of Afghanistan’s poorest people was among six people killed yesterday in an attack in the east of the country, officials said.
The armed assault in Jalalabad, capital of Nangarhar Province, prompted appalled reactions in Afghanistan and internationally.
Tetsu Nakamura, 73, was the head of Peace Japan Medical Services, known as Peshawar Kai in Japanese, and had been working in the region since the 1980s.
A spokesman for Afghan President Ashraf Ghani called Nakamura “one of the closest friends of Afghanistan.”
Nakamura in 2003 was awarded the Ramon Magsaysay Award — often called Asia’s Nobel Prize.
Nakamura, who had been shot in the chest, was being transferred to a hospital in Bagram when he died, Attaullah Khogyani, a spokesman for Nangarhar’s governor, said, adding that five Afghans were also killed: three of Nakamura’s security guards, a driver and another colleague.
The UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan expressed “revulsion” at Nakamura’s killing.
It was “a senseless act of violence against a man who dedicated much of his life to helping” Afghanistan’s most vulnerable, the mission said.
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