Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISKP) Claims Suicide Attack Against Senior Taliban Members In Kabul

On May 22, 2022, the Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISKP) claimed responsibility for a suicide attack at a conference attended by senior members of the Taliban in the Afghan capital of Kabul.[1] While ISKP has announced that participants at the conference were killed or wounded, among them senior Taliban members, the Taliban have imposed a blackout on the incident and have not yet released any information about the extent of the casualties.

The official Islamic State (ISIS) A’maq News Agency reports that according to “security sources an Islamic State fighter succeeded in reaching the big hotel where the Taliban militia was holding a memorial ceremony for its former leader Akhtar Mansur [who was killed on May 21, 2016, in an American aerial attack], near the Hamid Karzai [International] Airport in Kabul. The sources stated that the suicide fighter managed to break through all the security barriers set up by the militia around the area and to reach the gate to the hotel, when several senior members of the militia and its operatives were gathered there. He detonated his explosive belt when he was among them and caused the death or injury of several of them and the damage or destruction of five vehicles.” In its statement, A’maq notes that “Taliban has imposed a heavy blackout on the nature of the explosion and its consequences because it was directed at a high-level ceremony attended by heads of the militia.”

A photograph of the suicide bomber was included with the statement, although his name wasn’t supplied. However, in another statement released by ISIS a short time before the A’maq announcement,[2]the suicide attacker was referred to as “Shahram Muwahhid.”

The pro-ISIS Al-Murhafat Foundation published a poster[3] which describes the attacks as a “great security blow to the Taliban movement,” and notes that among those present at the event was senior Taliban official [Abdul Ghani] Baradar – “America’s current man in Afghanistan.” The poster mocks the Taliban claim that it has succeeded in putting an end to the ISIS attacks on the territory of its emirate and asserts that this claim is refuted daily by the organization’s fighters who operate against the members of the Taliban, “the polytheistic Shi’ites” and the rest of the apostates in what they refer to as Khorasan Province.

It should be noted that on its official Twitter account, Taliban published photographs from the memorial ceremony and made no mention of a terrorist attack.[4]

It is also noteworthy that This operation seems to be another significant ISIS operation against the Taliban and that since the movement assumed power in the country there has been an escalation in the ISIS attacks against it.