Kabul, Afghanistan – As soon as he heard about the blast at the Kaj Education Center, Mukhtar Modabber, 30, rushed to the site of the blast and desperately prayed for his sister to be safe.
His 17-year-old sibling and prospective university student Omulbanin Asghari on Friday took a test at the school in the Dasht-e-Barchi neighborhood of western Kabul, a predominantly Shia Muslim area home to the minority Hazara community.
When Modabber arrived, he found his sister’s body lying motionless on the ground. “I couldn’t believe my eyes,” he told Al Jazeera.
Modabber, an instructor at the centre, said Asghari, the youngest of five siblings, was a determined student driven to succeed.
She recently took taekwondo classes and was preparing for the English as a Foreign Language test.
“Ernesto Che Guevara was her favorite author and revolutionary fighter. She also wanted to be a leader in the future,” he said, adding that his sister was planning to study abroad.
Packed with 300 to 400 students – girls and boys taking their university entrance exams – the center was attacked by a suicide bomber.
“My sister had dreams and she wanted to work for women who were deprived of their basic rights under the Taliban. But she’s dead,” Modabber said.
The United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan said on Twitter that at least 38 people were killed and 82 others injured.
“[The] The majority of victims are girls and young women.
A survivor of the attack, student Maryam Faruz, also 17, arrived at the center at 7am on Friday and took a vacant seat near the door. She said she was working on math questions when she heard gunshots outside the room.
“Everyone got up after we heard the shots. It was messy,” she said, her voice shaking as she recalled the attack.
Pen and paper in hand, Faruz ran and took cover in the next room. “We all tried to save our lives, but the attacker was faster than some of my colleagues,” she said.
Minutes after the explosion, Faruz crawled past the bodies of her classmates strewn on the floor.
She said no ambulances were at the scene after the explosion. “Mutilated bodies were taken to a nearby mosque and other victims were taken to hospitals by locals in wheelbarrows and private vehicles.”
International community reacts
The attack drew international criticism, with some calling on the Afghan authorities to do more to protect minorities and bring perpetrators to justice.
“I condemn today’s horrific attack,” Richard Bennett, the UN special rapporteur on Afghanistan, said in a tweet on Friday. “The attack on education for Hazaras and Shias must end.”
Although no group has claimed responsibility, the local ISIL (ISIS) affiliate, a rival to the Taliban, has similarly attacked educational centers in recent years, including a suicide attack on a school in the same neighborhood that killed 24 people in 2020 died.
The Kaj Learning Center was the target of a similar attack in 2018, killing 40 and injuring 67 others. After the blast, the center changed its name from Mawoud to Kaj and resumed education for disadvantaged Hazara children.
Last month, New York-based Human Rights Watch said in a report that since “the Taliban took over Afghanistan in August 2021, the Islamic State [ISIL or ISIS] The subsidiary has claimed responsibility for 13 attacks on Hazaras and has been linked to at least three others, killing and injuring at least 700 people.”
“The Taliban authorities have done little to protect these communities from suicide bombings and other unlawful attacks, or to provide medical and other assistance to the victims and their families,” the report said.
Speaking in Kabul on Saturday, Taliban leader and Second Deputy Prime Minister Abdul Salam Hanafi condemned the latest attack and vowed to hold the perpetrators accountable. He called it a crime against humanity, adding: “There is no greater crime than this”.
Attack on girls’ education
After graduating from high school in Jaghori district of Ghazni province in 2021, Faruz moved to western Kabul where she joined her older sister, a university student.
Faruz said her father, a farmer, worked hard to save enough money for her and her sister to pursue their academic dreams.
“Neither of my parents are educated, but they believe that a good education is the only way to a better future,” she said.
Like Faruz, most of the center’s students moved from their villages to the Afghan capital after the Taliban banned girls over the age of 12 from attending school.
Up to eight bodies were transported back to Jaghori district on Friday, she said, adding that they were all female students.
Another student, Ahmad Qais Sadat, 19, who survived the attack by climbing the compound’s wall after hearing the gunshots, described the scene as “apocalyptic.”
He told Al Jazeera the attackers had one goal: to prevent them from accessing education.
“I’m no longer [only] responsible for my own dreams. I also have to keep my friends’ dreams alive,” he said.
Sadat’s words were repeated repeatedly by other students Al Jazeera spoke to.
Modabber, the instructor who lost his sister in the attack, said he is more determined than ever to help his students succeed.
“I can’t give up. I have to stand tall and strong,” he said. “Not just for my sister, but for girls who are no longer able to go to school.”