Attackers targeted two police stations in the Afghan capital, Kabul, on May 9 killing at least seven people and wounding 20 others, authorities said.
Interior Minister Wais Barmak told reporters that eight militants took part in the attacks in Kabul’s Dasht-e Barchi and Shar-e Naw neighborhoods.
In the first attack on the Dasht-e Barchi police station in western Kabul, two militants threw hand grenades and blew themselves up, setting the building on fire, Barmak said.
A third suicide bomber was shot dead by police, Barmak added. Two police officers were killed and three more people were wounded in the attack, Barmak told reporters.
The second attack unfolded in the Shar-e Naw business district near the office of a travel agency that processes visa applications for India. A suicide bomber struck the entrance to the police station to clear the way for another four attackers, Barmak said.
According to the minister, at least two other attackers fired on security forces from a nearby building.
The fighting lasted for at least four hours before all attackers were killed, officials said.
The Islamic State extremist group claimed responsibility for the first attack and the Taliban said it was behind the second assault.
However, Afghanistan’s National Directorate of Security said that the coordinated assaults were organized by the Haqqani network, a militant group affiliated with the Taliban that has a long record of urban attacks.
The Taliban and an IS affiliate have carried out a series of massive attacks in Kabul in recent months.
Twin suicide bombings in Kabul on April 30 claimed by IS militants killed at least 25 people, including nine journalists who had rushed to the scene of the first attack. Among the dead were two RFE/RL journalists and an RFE/RL trainee.