Iran is dispatching a planeload of humanitarian aid to those wounded in the Friday terrorist attack at a mosque in the northeastern Afghanistan’s Kunduz province, which was claimed by the Daesh terrorist group.
Iran’s embassy in Kabul said on Monday that a plane carrying humanitarian aid, including medicine and medical equipment, is to be sent to Afghanistan later in the day.
More than 150 people were killed in a ghastly attack at Gozar-e-Sayed Abad Mosque in the Khanabad area of Kunduz, with a predominantly Hazara population, on Friday.
A Daesh terrorist, masquerading as a worshipper, detonated his explosives during Friday prayers. The victims were all Hazara Shias, the third-largest ethnic group in Afghanistan.
Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf on Sunday condemned the terrorist attack targeting worshippers at the packed Shia mosque in Kunduz, warning that enemies are plotting to stoke religious and ethnic discord in the country.
On Saturday, Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei called on Afghanistan’s authorities to punish the perpetrators of the act of terror.
Two decades of foreign war and occupation has left Afghanistan impoverished and mired in an extended humanitarian crisis. The US-led war in the country came to an end in August this year, when all foreign forces were withdrawn from Afghanistan.
Iran has since increased its humanitarian support for the war-stricken country. The Islamic Republic has also spent millions of dollars on development and reconstruction projects and has built hundreds of kilometers of highways and railroads in its eastern neighbor.
Iran last week delivered a fifth shipment of humanitarian aid for the Afghan people to the interim Taliban government in Afghanistan.
The humanitarian aid, which weighted 50 tons and included sugar, rice, oil, and hygiene supplies, was handed over to the Afghan Red Crescent on behalf of the Red Crescent delegation of the Islamic Republic.
Iran had also sent a humanitarian aid cargo — weighing 94 tons, including food and health supplies — to Afghanistan from the Dugharun land border last Monday. The cargo was transported on six trailers and was delivered to Taliban officials at the border.