Boys being forced into suicide attacks: NDS

KABUL): Most of suicide bombers were forced to carry out attacks in the country, the Afghan intelligence service alleged on Tuesday.

One of the attackers, a Pakistani militant, recently surrendered to Afghan forces in eastern Nangarhar province, a spokesman for the National Directorate of Security said.

“But the Pakistani, who was forced by militants across the border to attack Afghan forces, surrendered,” Lotfullah Mashal told a press conference in Kabul.

Identifying the detainee as Khalid Rahman, Mashal insisted most youngsters were compelled to carry out suicide attacks in Afghanistan against their will.

Rahman told reporters that his brother, Gul Rahman was a student at a religious school in Miranshah, the main town in Pakistan‘s lawless South Waziristan tribal region.

The boy went missing from his school two years ago. After a month, five gunmen arrived in a car and told his family that Gul Rahman had embraced martyrdom.

Khalid Rahman then launched a search for his missing brother and visited the madrasa where his brother was studying. He also went to a religious school run by the Haqqani network, but he was told that his brother was no more alive.

During the search, he was kidnapped by gunmen and taken to a militant training centre in Hangu town. Rahman said he was among hundreds of young men getting military training at the camp.

‘“We learned different suicide bombing techniques at the training centre,” the 20-year-old said. “I did not want to shed the blood of innocent Afghan people, so I surrendered to security forces.”

ma/mud