KABUL: The deputy governor of Kandahar province in south Afghanistan has been shot dead at a university in the provincial capital, a spokesman for the governor said yesterday.
The shooting was the latest in a string of deadly attacks this year on officials and powerbrokers in Kandahar, once a base for the Islamist Taliban’s leader, Mullah Omar, and where the insurgency has its roots.
Abdul Qadim Patyal, a celebrated writer, was studying Pashto literature and in his final year at Kandahar University when his attacker fired at him through a window, the spokesman said. “Patyal was transferred to hospital by his bodyguards ... and passed away there,” the spokesman said.
In March, the governor’s chief of staff was killed in a bombing claimed by the Taliban, while in July, a powerful ally of the president was assassinated at his heavily fortified home in Kandahar.
Reuters
