A gunman stormed a mosque in western Afghanistan and killed six people, a government spokesman says.
Ministry of Interior Affairs spokesman Abdul Mateen Qani said “an unknown armed person shot at civilian worshippers in a mosque” at about 9pm (16:30 GMT) on Monday in Andisheh town of Guzara district in Herat province.
“Six civilians were martyred and one civilian was injured,” he wrote on social media platform X early on Tuesday morning.
The state-run Bakhtar News Agency gave the same death toll for the attack. Citing local sources, local media channel Tolo reported the mosque belonged to Afghanistan’s minority Shia community.
A prayer leader, known as Imam, was also killed in the attack, local media reports said. The Iranian embassy in Kabul condemned the attack.
While no group has yet claimed the attack, the regional chapter of ISIL (ISIS) is the largest security threat in Afghanistan and has frequently targeted Shia communities.(Al Jazeera)
