Afghan Officials Say Girl Tricked Into Being Suicide Bomber
Insurgents reportedly gave 8-year-old bomb, detonated it remotely when she approached police.
| Posted Sunday, June 26, 2011, at 2:24 PM ET
Officials are reporting that an 8-year-old girl in Afghanistan’s Charchino District was tricked by insurgents into carrying a bomb that later exploded as she neared a police vehicle, according to The New York Times.
The incident reportedly occurred in the remote town of Uwshi in Uruzguan Province; independent verification of the incident was difficult.
An Interior Ministry representative told the BBC that the girl was given a package wrapped in cloth, told nothing would happen and asked to bring it to the police. When she came close to a police vehicle, it was remotely detonated. Only the girl was killed in the explosion.
Officials called the incident a “crime and a shameful act,” saying that insurgents had "no boundary, no respect for anything." Recent reports suggest that insurgents in the country are recruiting more adult women and young boys to carry out suicide attacks, though the Taliban has denied doing so.
A suicide bomb attack on a medical clinic Saturday in Afghanistan killed 37, though local health officials estimated the number to be higher, as families reportedly removed bodies from the rubble of the clinic before they were counted. Sunday, four NATO soldiers were killed in separate incidents.
