The elections are considered a dry run for the presidential vote to be held in 2019 and a test of whether Afghanistan’s Western-backed government can overcome past election problems of poor security and fraud.

President Ashraf Ghani and international donor countries have all said elections need to happen this year. Some Western diplomats doubt, however, that there is enough time to organize the vote in 2018.

The Independent Elections Commission (IEC) would hold the election on Oct. 20, IEC chairman Gula Jan Abdul Badi Sayad said on Friday. He said voter registration would start in mid-April.

The current parliament’s five-year term was to expire in June 2015, but Ghani extended it by decree amid security fears and disagreements on how to prevent fraud.

The main challenges ahead of the vote are registering Afghans, many of whom do not have identification documents, and setting up ballot stations in remote areas. Plans for voter security and preventing fraud are also critical.

Afghanistan has held two parliamentary elections since the end of Taliban rule, in 2005 and 2010. District council elections have never been held.

The 2014 presidential election produced no agreed winner and led to a U.S.-brokered deal that saw former rivals Ghani and Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah forced into an uneasy coalition that has struggled to win popular support.

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Source: Reuters

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In the worst incident, Taliban militants stormed an army post in the western province of Farah, killing 22 soldiers.

A suicide attack in the capital Kabul left at least three security officers dead.

There has been a surge in militant attacks in recent months and the army is often targeted.

Some analysts see it as a response to a new, more aggressive strategy announced by US President Donald Trump last year, which committed the US army to an open-ended conflict, with the focus on “killing terrorists”.

Early on Saturday, Taliban forces mounted an overnight attack on a base in Farah.

Weapons were seized and the Afghan military said the Taliban had incurred a “lot of casualties”.

In Kabul, a suicide bomber detonated his explosives in an area dotted with key diplomatic buildings.

“I was driving nearby when I heard a big explosion, the windows of my car were smashed. I saw several wounded people on the street near me,” a witness told Afghan channel Tolonews TV.

Jihadist group Islamic State said it carried out the attack, Reuters reported.

There were further suicide attacks in Helmand province in the south, leaving two army members dead, and others, including women and children, injured.

The Taliban control large swathes of Afghanistan – but IS militants hold sway in a much smaller number of districts.

However, both groups have demonstrated their ability to hit targets across the country.

They have often come into conflict with each other, too.

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Source: BBC

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Sixteen other Afghan soldiers were injured, a defence ministry spokesman told the BBC.

Five militants were involved, said the spokesman. Four were killed in the attack but one was arrested.

The attack has been claimed by the Islamic State (IS), according to the militant group’s Amaq news agency.

Earlier reports said the attack had taken place at Marshal Fahim National Defense University, which is near the military base.

It comes days after the deadliest bombing for months hit Kabul when Taliban militants in an ambulance packed with explosives killed at least 100 people.

How did Monday’s attack unfold?

Several explosions were heard, as well as small-arms fire, as the attack began at about 05:00 local time (00:30 GMT) at the military base in western Kabul.

Two attackers blew themselves up, two others were killed by security forces and a fifth was arrested, defence ministry spokesman Gen Dawlat Waiziri told the BBC.

Four AK-47 assault rifles, one suicide vest and one rocket-launcher were seized, he said.

The president’s spokesperson said none of the attackers had been able to get further than the first gate, Afghan news website Tolo reports.

Afghan military institutions are frequently targeted by militants.

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Source: BBC

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Attackers drove an ambulance laden with explosives past a police checkpoint into a street that was only open to government workers.

It happened near the old interior ministry building and offices of the European Union and High Peace Council.

The Taliban have said they carried out the attack, the deadliest for months.

A week ago, Taliban militants killed 22 people in a luxury Kabul hotel.

Witnesses say the area – home to foreign embassies and the city’s police headquarters – was crowded with people when the bomb exploded on Saturday at about 12:15 local time (08:45 GMT). Plumes of smoke were seen from around the city.

Officials said the death toll would probably continue to rise as casualties were brought to hospitals for medical attention.

The International Committee of the Red Cross said the use of an ambulance was “harrowing”.

This is the deadliest attack in Kabul in several months.

In October, 176 people were killed in bomb attacks across Afghanistan in one week. The country’s security forces in particular have suffered heavy casualties at the hands of the Taliban, who want to re-impose their strict version of Islamic law in the country.

In May, 150 people were killed by a suicide bomb attack in Kabul. The Taliban denied any role, but the Afghan government says its affiliate, the Haqqani group, carried it out with support from Pakistan.

Pakistan denies supporting militants that carry out attacks in Afghanistan. This month, the US cut its security aid to Pakistan, saying it had failed to take action against terrorist networks on its soil.

The Taliban control large swathes of Afghanistan and parts of neighbouring Pakistan.

They were ousted from power in Afghanistan after a US-led invasion in 2001 but returned to run some key areas.

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Source: BBC

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It happened near the old interior ministry building, which is close to the offices of the European Union and the High Peace Council.

One news agency reported that several people had been killed. The Taliban have said they carried out the attack.

A week ago, Taliban militants killed 22 people in a luxury Kabul hotel.

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Source: BBC

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At least five civilians were killed and six were injured in the siege, the interior ministry said on Sunday.

All three of the attackers have been killed, a ministry spokesman said. More than 150 people were rescued.

The gunmen burst into the Intercontinental Hotel on Saturday evening, shooting at guests and staff and detonating grenades.

Special forces battled to secure the hotel and rescue people trapped inside, ministry spokesman Nasrat Rahimi said. He added that one foreigner was among those killed.

The rescued guests included 41 foreigners.

The interior ministry initially said there were four attackers, but a later statement said there were only three.

No group has said it carried out the attack, but the Taliban targeted the Intercontinental hotel in 2011.

Saturday’s siege came just days after the US embassy in Kabul issued a warning about hotels in the city.

“We are aware of reports that extremist groups may be planning an attack against hotels in Kabul,” the embassy wrote in a public security alert published Thursday, though it highlighted another hotel near the international airport as a possible target.

“These groups may also be targeting public gatherings/demonstrations, government facilities, transportation, markets, and places where foreigners are known to congregate.”

Another interior ministry spokesman told AFP news agency that an investigation had begun into how the attackers had breached security, which was handed over to a private company two weeks ago.

“They probably used a back door in the kitchen to enter,” he said.

The Intercontinental is a state-owned hotel which often hosts weddings, conferences and political gatherings.

Some reports said the hotel had been hosting an IT conference attended by provincial officials when the gunmen stormed it.

The Taliban attack in 2011 killed 21 people, including nine militants.

Security has been tightened in Kabul since last May, when a huge truck bomb killed at least 150 people.

However, there have been several attacks in recent months. They include a bomb at a Shia cultural centre last month that killed more than 40 people.

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Source: BBC

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Working with mobile security firm Lookout, researchers discovered that malware in fake messaging designed to look like WhatsApp and Signal had stolen gigabytes of data.

Targets included military personnel, activists, journalists and lawyers.

Researchers say they traced the malware to a Lebanese government building.

The threat, dubbed Dark Caracal by the researchers, looks as if it could come from a nation state and appears to use shared infrastructure linked to other nation-state hackers, the report said.

The malware takes advantage of known exploits and targets mainly Android phones.

Data was traced back to a server in a building belonging to the Lebanese General Security Directorate in Beirut, according to researchers.

“Based on the available evidence, it is likely that the GDGS is associated with or directly supporting the actors behind Dark Caracal,” the report said.

Mobile threat
“People in the US, Canada, Germany, Lebanon, and France have been hit by Dark Caracal. Targets include military personnel, activists, journalists, and lawyers, and the types of stolen data range from call records and audio recordings to documents and photos,” said EFF director of cybersecurity Eva Galperin.

“This is a very large, global campaign, focused on mobile devices. Mobile is the future of spying, because phones are full of so much data about a person’s day-to-day life.”

Mike Murray, vice-president of security intelligence at Lookout said: “Dark Caracal is part of a trend we’ve seen mounting over the past year whereby traditional advanced persistent threat actors are moving toward using mobile as a primary target platform.”

Online mercenaries
In a statement published on the Lookout blog, Google said it was confident that the infected apps were not downloaded from its Play Store.

“Google has identified the apps associated with this actor, none of the apps were on the Google Play Store. Google Play Protect has been updated to protect user devices from these apps and is in the process of removing them from all affected devices.”

The researchers believe Dark Caracal has been operating since 2012 but it has been hard to track because of the diversity of seemingly unrelated espionage campaigns originating from the same domain names.

Over the years Dark Caracal’s work has been repeatedly misattributed to other cybercrime groups, the researchers said.

In November, Afghanistan moved to ban WhatsApp and Telegram as a way to stop insurgent groups from using encrypted messaging. And in December, Iran moved to restrict use of the apps after a series of anti-establishment protests.

Use of an app that can steal data would give nation states much more information than simply banning them, said Prof Alan Woodward, a cybersecurity expert at the University of Surrey.

“It is always hard to prove that a nation state is involved. During the Cold War, countries made use of mercenaries and that’s what we are seeing online now.”

He said it was unclear where the infected apps had been downloaded from.

“Google is saying that they were not downloaded from there but it is difficult to know where else they came from. It may be that people are getting suckered into something that looks like an official site. People need to be careful what they are downloading.”

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Source: BBC

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The interior ministry told the BBC the suicide blast was followed by another two explosions in the area.

No-one has yet said they were behind the attack.

In recent months, so-called Islamic State has been carrying out attacks on Shia targets across the country.

The Taliban have issued a statement saying they were not involved.

Images on social media showed a number of bodies in a courtyard following the blast.

Deputy interior ministry spokesman Nasrat Rahimi told Agence France-Presse: “The target of the attack was the Tabayan cultural centre. A ceremony was being held to mark the 38th anniversary of the Soviet invasion in Afghanistan when the explosion went off.”

A number of students were reportedly attending a discussion forum with media group members at the offices.

The head of Afghan Press, the media branch of the Shia organisation, told the BBC that so far dozens of bodies had been carried from the building and officials have reported dozens more being brought to hospitals.

In October, at least 39 people were killed in an attack on a mosque belonging to the Shia minority.

Ten people were also killed in a suicide bomb attack near the compound of Afghanistan’s intelligence agency in Kabul on Monday.

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Source: BBC

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The blast struck close to the German embassy in Zanbaq Square with civilians said to be the main casualties.

The wounded staggered from the site of a blast so strong it blew out windows and doors hundreds of metres away.

No group has yet said it carried out the bombing but the Taliban and IS have both been behind recent attacks.

When and where did the attack take place?

The bomb went off at about 08:25 local time (03:55 GMT) during the rush hour in the Afghan capital.

Makeshift ambulances carried wounded away from the scene as frantic relatives gathered at the cordoned-off perimeter of the blast site.

Images showed dozens of blackened and burned out cars.

Basir Mujahid a spokesman for Kabul police, told Reuters news agency the explosion had taken place to the German embassy but added it was “hard to say what the exact target is”.

There are many other key buildings in the area, including the presidential palace and a number of embassies, including the British.

Some reports say the bomb was in a lorry or water tanker.

Questions will surely be asked about how an attack could target such a heavily fortified area.

The zone is considered the safest in the capital, with 3m (10ft) high blast walls.

Who were the casualties?

Initial reports suggest civilians bore the brunt of the casualties.

The health ministry said the casualty figures were expected to rise further.

Spokesman Ismael Kawoosi said: “They are still bringing bodies and wounded people to hospitals.”

A German security source said it was unclear whether any of Germany’s embassy staff had been killed or injured.

French officials said the country’s embassy had been damaged but there were no signs at this stage of any French casualties.

India’s Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj said the staff of its embassy, close to the blast, were safe.

A journalist for Afghanistan’s Tolo news agency said some of the victims were from the Roshan mobile phone company, but this has not been confirmed.

Who could have been behind the attack?

No group has yet said it carried out Wednesday’s attack, but last month the Taliban announced the start of a major spring offensive, saying their main focus would be foreign forces, targeting them with a mix of conventional, guerrilla, insider and suicide attacks.

The US has about 8,400 troops in Afghanistan, with another 5,000 from Nato allies.

A recent Taliban attack on an Afghan army training compound in the northern city of Mazar-e Sharif killed at least 135 soldiers, and led to the resignation of the defence minister and army chief of staff.

The so-called Islamic State in Afghanistan has also been active, saying it was behind a suicide bomb attack this month on a Nato convoy that was passing the US embassy in Kabul. At least eight civilians were killed.

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Source: BBC

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He died 10 days ago in an joint special forces operation in eastern Nangarhar province, the US military said.

Hasib is believed to have been behind March’s attack on a military hospital in Kabul, killing at least 50 people.
Last month, the Pentagon said Hasib had probably been killed in a raid by US and Afghan special forces.

Two US army rangers also died in the raid, near an underground system of tunnels believed to be used by IS which were targeted by the largest conventional bomb ever used by the US.

There has been no confirmation of the death by IS.

Abdul Hasib was appointed as the leader of IS in Afghanistan last year after his predecessor was killed in a US drone strike.

He is credited with masterminding the Kabul hospital attack, although some Afghan security experts questioned whether a group still thought to be relatively small in Afghanistan could be capable of planning and carrying out such a large scale operation.

In addition to killing Hasib, the US military said US and Afghan forces had killed or captured hundreds of IS militants in an offensive this year.

“To date, the campaign has liberated over half of the districts that IS controlled, which has allowed local residents to return to their homes for the first time in more than two years,” the statement said.

There is no independent confirmation of the claims.

Sediq Sediqi, a spokesman for the Afghan president, blamed Hasib for the hospital attack and congratulated the military for killing him.

“AFG Special Forces hunted down the leader of IS in Afghanistan; big success for our heroes,” he tweeted.

IS announced it was moving into Afghanistan and Pakistan when it declared its so-called Khorasan Province (sometimes called ISIS-K) in 2015, and has since carried out a number of deadly and high-profile attacks.

In July 2016, a suicide bomb attack on a Shia Muslim rally in Kabul killed about 80 people.

Three months later, two similar attacks during the Shia religious festival of Ashura claimed about 30 lives, and in November 2016 an attack at a mosque in Kabul killed more than 30.

IS also claimed a suicide attack at Kabul’s Supreme Court in February that killed 22 people, and the group has stepped up activity in both Afghanistan and Pakistan.

But it has faced armed opposition from the larger and more powerful Afghan Taliban – correspondents say as a consequence, IS has struggled to increase its support or the amount of territory it holds in Afghanistan.
Its main strongholds are in the eastern provinces of Nangarhar and Kunar.

The failure of IS to widen its political and territorial base in Afghanistan is one reason advanced by analysts for its focus in recent months on headline grabbing attacks in the capital and elsewhere.

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Source: BBC

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