Four Indians among 14 dead in Kabul guesthouse siege

May 14, 2015

Kabul, May 14: The Taliban on Thursday claimed responsibility for an attack during a concert at a Kabul guesthouse that left 14 people dead including four Indians and an American.

Kabul guesthouse siege

"It was a suicide mission carried out by one of our mujaheddin from Logar. The attack was planned carefully to target the party in which important people and Americans were attending," the militants said in a statement.

Security sources in Delhi told Hindustan Times the attack was aimed at the Indian ambassador to Afghanistan. In Afghanistan, President Ashraf Ghani's envoy Ahmad Zia Massoud told local media that the terrorists attacked the guesthouse thinking the Indian ambassador, Amar Sinha, was in the compound.

Sinha was scheduled to visit the guesthouse for a Hindustani classical concert by Ustaad Altaf Hussain. Hussain was present in the guesthouse during the attack and is safe according to the Indian embassy in Kabul.

Kabul siege

At least one gunman attacked the guesthouse popular with foreigners in a bold assault that showed Afghanistan still faces security challenges.

Authorities cordoned off the area around the Park Palace guest house in Kabul's Kolola Pushta, a diplomatic enclave in the Afghan capital that includes a number of guesthouses used by foreigners, immediately after the attack began at about 8:30pm local time (1600 GMT).

A standoff with police ended about five hours later as ambulances raced out of the area.

Similar brazen assaults in the past have been carried out by the Taliban and the al Qaeda-linked Haqqani network.

The brutal assault was reminiscent of two attacks by Taliban fighters in Kabul last year, one on a restaurant and another on a hotel.

A spokeswoman for the US Embassy confirmed that one American was killed in the attack.

Three who had lived at the guesthouse were rescued and sheltering at the Indian Embassy, a diplomat said.

"Unfortunately a few Indian casualties among others at the Kabul g/house attack today," Indian Ambassador Amar Sinha tweeted but official sources later told the Press Trust of India that four Indians were among the dead.

Rahimi said at least 44 people who had been trapped inside the guesthouse - some there for a concert, others who had been having dinner - were rescued by police and special forces.

He also said he could verify that there had been just one attacker, although initial reports from police indicated several gunmen were involved.

"The attack did not start with an explosion at the main gate or killing of guards - whatever it was it started from inside the hotel," Rahimi said.

Kolola Pushta, home to several international guest houses and hotels, is near both the Ministry of Interior and the Indian Embassy.

Taliban gunmen killed nine people - including three children - in the upscale Serena Hotel in Kabul last year. Two months earlier, attackers stormed into a popular Lebanese restaurant in the capital and gunned down 21 people, including three United Nations staff and a senior IMF official.

Earlier on Wednesday, gunmen opened fire at a meeting of Muslim clerics in the southern province of Helmand, killing at least seven people, police said.

The Ulemma Council, the highest religious authority in a deeply conservative country, had repeatedly announced its support for security forces fighting the hardline Islamist Taliban insurgents.

The Taliban have stepped up attacks since most foreign forces pulled out at the end of last year.

Ousted from power in 2001, the Taliban have been fighting to bring down the US-backed government in Kabul.

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News Network
March 18,2024

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Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed a landslide victory in the just-concluded presidential polls, securing him a fifth term in power. While Putin hailed the results as an indication of "trust" and "hope" in him, critics panned the polls for its preordained nature.

As early results poured in, Putin won 87.8% of the vote, the highest-ever result in Russia's post-Soviet history, Reuters quoted Public Opinion Foundation (FOM) exit polls. The Russian Public Opinion Research Centre (VCIOM) put Putin on 87%. 

If he completes the term, the 71-year-old President will also script history as Russia's longest-serving leader for more than 200 years, overtaking Josef Stalin. 

While Communist candidate Nikolai Kharitonov finished second with just under 4%, newcomer Vladislav Davankov third, and ultra-nationalist Leonid Slutsky fourth, partial results suggested.

In his victory speech, Putin said he would prioritise resolving tasks associated with Russia's "special military operation" in Ukraine and would strengthen the Russian military. 

"We have many tasks ahead. But when we are consolidated - no matter who wants to intimidate us, suppress us - nobody has ever succeeded in history, they have not succeeded now, and they will not succeed ever in the future," said Putin. He was welcomed by his supporters to the stage with "Putin Putin" chants. He also hailed the results as an indication of "trust" and "hope" in him.

Later, while interacting with reporters, Putin also warned the West that a direct conflict between Russia and the U.S.-led NATO military alliance would mean the planet was one step away from World War Three but said hardly anyone wanted such a scenario. "It is clear to everyone, that this will be one step away from a full-scale World War Three. I think hardly anyone is interested in this," Putin told reporters after winning the biggest-ever landslide in post-Soviet Russian history.

Meanwhile, the Western world condemned the elections, stating the polls were neither free nor fair. While Germany called it a "pseudo-election" under an authoritarian ruler reliant on censorship, repression and violence, UK Foreign Secretary Lord Cameron condemned "the illegal holding of elections on Ukrainian territory".

Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky said, "The Russian dictator is simulating another election".

Earlier during the elections, heeding an opposition call to protest, hundreds of  Russians crowded outside polling stations at noon Sunday, on the last day of the elections. The associates of Alexei Navalny, the critic of Putin who died earlier this month in an Arctic prison, had urged people who were unhappy with Putin or the war in Ukraine to go to the polls at noon on Sunday. Many turned up and lines outside a number of polling stations both inside Russia and at its embassies around the world appeared to swell at that time.

Among those heeding the call was Yulia Navalnaya, Navalny's widow, who joined a long line in Berlin. She later told reporters that she cast her vote and wrote her late husband's name on the ballot.  Asked whether she had a message for Putin, Navalnaya replied: "Please stop asking for messages from me or from somebody for Mr. Putin. There could be no negotiations and nothing with Mr. Putin, because he's a killer, he's a gangster."

One woman in Moscow, who said her name was Yulia, told the AP that she was voting for the first time. "Even if my vote doesn't change anything, my conscience will be clear ... for the future that I want to see for our country," she said. Like others, she didn't give her full name because of security concerns.

Another Moscow voter, who also identified himself only by his first name, Vadim, said he hoped for change, but added that "unfortunately, it's unlikely".

More acts of rebellion were reported on Saturday too. Cases were filed against at least 15 people for pouring dye in ballot boxes, started fires or lobbing Molotov cocktails at polling stations. Ella Pamfilova, the head of Russia’s CEC, said 29 polling stations across 20 regions in Russia were targeted, including eight arson attempts.

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News Network
March 16,2024

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Ottawa, Mar 16: An Indian-origin couple and their teenage daughter were killed in a "suspicious" fire which tore through their home last week in Canada's Ontario province, police said on Friday.

A fire engulfed a home at the Big Sky Way and Van Kirk Drive area of Brampton on March 7, a press release by the Peel Police said.

After the blaze was put out, investigators located what was believed to be human remains within the gutted house, but the number of people killed couldn't be ascertained at the time.

The charred remains were on Friday identified as those of three family members: 51-year-old Rajiv Warikoo; his wife, 47-year-old Shilpa Kotha; and their 16-year-old daughter, Mahek Warikoo.

Police said that they resided at the address before the fire.

Peel police Constable Taryn Young on Friday said the fire had been deemed suspicious, the CTV news channel reported.

"At this time, we are investigating this with our homicide bureau, and we are deeming this as suspicious as the Ontario Fire Marshal has deemed that this fire was not accidental," the report quoted Young as saying.

"There's not much left to it," Young said when asked about the possible cause of the fire.

"Looking into something like that as a fire marshal, I'm sure it's very tough when there is not much left to look at. But we are exhausting all avenues," she said.

The deceased family's neighbour, Kenneth Yousaf, said that the family had lived on the street for about 15 years, and he never noticed any problems with them.

Yousaf said he was alerted to the fire last week by a family member, who heard a big "bang." "When we came out, the house was on fire. So sad. Within a few hours, everything was down to the ground," the report quoted Yousaf as saying.

In a press release, police said they are continuing to investigate the deaths of the three family members and urged anyone with information to come forward.

"The circumstances surrounding the house fire remains the focus of an active investigation, and anyone with information or video footage (dashcam or otherwise) is urged to contact Homicide detectives," police said.

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News Network
March 28,2024

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Russia says it is "extremely hard to believe" that Daesh could have staged the recent hugely deadly attack on a Moscow concert hall that the country's intelligence and security officials have blamed on Ukraine and its Western backers.

Four gunmen burst into the Russian capital's Crocus City Hall on Friday and began shooting at the people, who were attending an event. The Takfiri terrorist group has allegedly claimed responsibility for the massacre that killed at least 143.

Speaking on Wednesday, however, Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova cast that claim into serious doubt.

"In order to ward off suspicions from the collective West, they urgently needed to come up with something, so they resorted to ISIS (Daesh), pulled an ace out of their sleeve, and literally a few hours after the terrorist attack, the Anglo-Saxon media began disseminating precisely these versions," she said.

The chief of the Russian internal intelligence (FSB), Alexander Bortnikov has suggested that not only Ukraine, but also the United States and Britain might have been behind the shooting.

The Russian Federal Security Service has also said the gunmen planned to travel to Ukraine, where they were to be welcomed as "heroes." The FSB said Western intelligence services aided the attackers.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has also suggested that Ukraine stood to derive benefit from the attack and that Kiev might have played a role.

He has said that someone on the Ukrainian side had prepared a "window" for the gunmen to escape across the border before they were captured in western Russia on Friday night.

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