Suicide bomb kills 15 in Afghan city, officials say

KABUL Reuters - A huge explosion tore through a Shiite mosque in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar during Friday prayers, killing at least 15 people and wounding 31, with the casualty toll likely to rise, officials said.

Taliban interior minister Qari Saeed Khosti said authorities were collecting details of the explosion, which took place days after a suicide bomb attack claimed by Islamic State ISIS on a Shiite mosque in the northern Kunduz City that killed scores of people.

Images and mobile video posted on social media by journalists showed many people apparently seriously wounded or dead on the floor of the Imam Bargah mosque.

Unsead Health official told the city's Mirwais Hospital that 15 dead and 31 wounded had been rushed to the hospital but the total was expected to rise, with ambulances still bringing victims there.

Taliban special forces arrived to secure the site and an appeal went out to residents to donate blood for wounded.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility.

The blast, coming so soon after the Kunduz attack, underscored the highly uncertain security situation in Afghanistan as the Taliban grapple with an escalating economic and humanitarian crisis that threatens millions of Americans with hunger.

The Western backed affiliate of ISIS, who is known as Islamic State Khorasan, has stepped up its attacks after the regional names for Afghanistan after the victory in August by the local government in Kabul in August.

The officials of Taliban have played down the threat from Islamic state but repeated attacks have tarnished its claim to have brought peace to Afghanistan after four decades of war.

The fact that the Shiite muslim minority was again targeted could also inflame tensions between different ethnic and sectarian groups in the largely Sunni-Sunni country.