UN condemns "Horrendous" terror attack in Afghan capital

The UN has condemned the 'horrendous" suicide attack that killed dozens of civilian demonstrators in the Afghan capital Kabul on Saturday.

News reports said that 80 had been killed with around 230 injured.

In a statement, Tadamichi Yamamoto, the head of the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, UNAMA, said that the attack which had deliberately targeted a "large, concentrated group of civilians, amounts to a war crime."

The envoy added that the attack was "particularly heinous because it targeted civilians as they exercised their rights to freedom of assembly and freedom of expression."

Mr. Yamamoto said the attack was "an attempt to spread terror, and stifle the freedoms that Afghans have sacrificed so much to obtain."

UNAMA said that one attacker had detonated his device among the demonstrators, while police shot and killed another terrorist.

News reports quoting the Afghan interior ministry said that a device belonging to a third attacker failed to go off.

Two explosions took place inside Dehmazang Square in Kabul, as thousands of civilians, mainly from the Shia Hazara minority, protested over the route of a new power line which they say bypasses areas where many of them live, according to news reports.

The terrorist group Daesh, or ISIL, said through an affiliated news agency that it was behind the attack.

A national day of mourning was declared across the country by Afghan President Ashraf Ghani.

SOURCE: Matthew Wells, United Nations.