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| Afghanistan/South Asia |
| School bombing probe focuses on mullah |
| 2004-09-02 |
| A probe into a bomb blast that killed nine children and an adult at an Afghan school has focused on a mullah who taught in the same building, a local official and sources close to the investigation said on Thursday. The Taliban, Afghanistan's ousted hard-line Islamist rulers, are active in the district of Zormat in the southeast province of Paktia, where the school was located, but a Taliban spokesman has denied any involvement in last Saturday's attack. But Paktia Governor Haji Assadullah Wafa said the mullah whom police want to question had links to the Taliban. A source close to the investigation said the mullah, or religious teacher, had not been seen for almost a week. The bombed building was shared by the mullah's madrassah, or religious school, and other teachers who taught a more progressive curriculum. "Mullah Nawab was teaching pupils at his madrassah how to use explosives and mines," Paktia's governor told Reuters. Maj. Scott Nelson of the U.S. military press center in Kabul, said villagers and Afghan officials had asserted that the motive for the attack was anger that some teachers in the building were giving courses in mathematics, languages and science. An Afghan women's nongovernment organization was also providing primary education for young boys in the same building. But no group operating at the school had received funding from the International Committee of the Red Cross as local government and U.S. military officials initially suggested. A school in neighboring Zabul province was recently forced to close because of threats from Taliban elements angered by its modern curriculum. |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |