On Saturday, Karzai expressed his sadness over the deaths of six members of a prominent Afghan family who were killed when a Taliban suicide bomber blew himself up Friday at Kabul supermarket frequented by affluent Afghans and foreigners.
In a statement, Karzai said Dr. Massoud Yama, a young doctor at a military hospital, his wife, Hamida Barmaki, a political science professor at Kabul University, and their four children died in the attack. She was an activist and served on the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission.
Yama's mother and Barmaki's mother-in-law is former Afghan senator Maboba Hoqiqmal, who currently is Karzai's legal affairs adviser.
Afghan police officials said initially that two or three foreigners were among eight people killed in the bombing. However, the Kabul Police Department released a statement Saturday evening saying that no foreigners died in the incident. So far, no foreign embassy has confirmed the death of any foreign victims.
Mohammad Zahir, the chief of criminal investigation for the Kabul police, said one man, one boy and six females — all Afghan — died in the blast. Fifteen other people were injured in the explosion — 10 Afghans and five foreigners, he said.
The Taliban said their target was an official with the U.S.-based Xe security contractor, formerly known as Blackwater. A representative for USTC Holdings, which recently bought the North Carolina-based Xe, said no one associated with the company was killed or wounded in the bombing.
A senior international intelligence official in Kabul said Saturday that the Taliban's Haqqani network, which has ties to al-Qaida, carried out the attack, but that there was no intelligence to suggest that the security contractor was being targeted. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to disclose the information.
Elsewhere in the capital, more than 200 demonstrators rallied at the Iranian Embassy to protest the execution of Afghans in Iran and call on Tehran to release Afghan political prisoners. Similar protests, all organized by the National Solidarity Party, attracted hundreds of other demonstrators in Mazar-i-Sharif in northern Afghanistan and Herat in the west.
Protesters in Kabul carried signs that said "Death to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad," showed photographs of Afghans held in Iran and depicted blood dripping from the red stripe of the Iranian flag.
Afghan lawmakers have claimed that as many as 45 Afghans had been executed in Iran, but the Afghan Ministry of Foreign Affairs has said that number is exaggerated. The ministry, which has raised the issue with Iranian officials in Tehran, has confirmed the execution of six Afghans in Iran but has not provided details about why they were killed.
"The ones fighting for freedom have been jailed in Iran," said Mohammad Yama, who helped organize the protest in Kabul. "We are here to show our unity. We wanted to burn down our effigy of Ahmadinejad, but the Afghan police took it away."
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In a statement, Karzai said Dr. Massoud Yama, a young doctor at a military hospital, his wife, Hamida Barmaki, a political science professor at Kabul University, and their four children died in the attack. She was an activist and served on the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission.
Yama's mother and Barmaki's mother-in-law is former Afghan senator Maboba Hoqiqmal, who currently is Karzai's legal affairs adviser.
Afghan police officials said initially that two or three foreigners were among eight people killed in the bombing. However, the Kabul Police Department released a statement Saturday evening saying that no foreigners died in the incident. So far, no foreign embassy has confirmed the death of any foreign victims.
Mohammad Zahir, the chief of criminal investigation for the Kabul police, said one man, one boy and six females — all Afghan — died in the blast. Fifteen other people were injured in the explosion — 10 Afghans and five foreigners, he said.
The Taliban said their target was an official with the U.S.-based Xe security contractor, formerly known as Blackwater. A representative for USTC Holdings, which recently bought the North Carolina-based Xe, said no one associated with the company was killed or wounded in the bombing.
A senior international intelligence official in Kabul said Saturday that the Taliban's Haqqani network, which has ties to al-Qaida, carried out the attack, but that there was no intelligence to suggest that the security contractor was being targeted. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to disclose the information.
Elsewhere in the capital, more than 200 demonstrators rallied at the Iranian Embassy to protest the execution of Afghans in Iran and call on Tehran to release Afghan political prisoners. Similar protests, all organized by the National Solidarity Party, attracted hundreds of other demonstrators in Mazar-i-Sharif in northern Afghanistan and Herat in the west.
Protesters in Kabul carried signs that said "Death to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad," showed photographs of Afghans held in Iran and depicted blood dripping from the red stripe of the Iranian flag.
Afghan lawmakers have claimed that as many as 45 Afghans had been executed in Iran, but the Afghan Ministry of Foreign Affairs has said that number is exaggerated. The ministry, which has raised the issue with Iranian officials in Tehran, has confirmed the execution of six Afghans in Iran but has not provided details about why they were killed.
"The ones fighting for freedom have been jailed in Iran," said Mohammad Yama, who helped organize the protest in Kabul. "We are here to show our unity. We wanted to burn down our effigy of Ahmadinejad, but the Afghan police took it away."
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