Policemen keeping watch at a site after an explosion in Jalalabad in Afghanistan yesterday. The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for a suicide attack in the city that killed 33 people and wounded more than 100 others, in what appears to be the first major attack by the militant group in the country. Separately, two explosives-rigged motorcycles were discovered in Jalalabad and destroyed with controlled detonations, the interior ministry said. President Ashraf Ghani’s government has repeatedly raised the ominous prospect of IS making inroads into Afghanistan, though the group that has captured swathes of territory in Syria and Iraq has never formally acknowledged having a presence in the country. The Taliban swiftly issued a strong condemnation of the Jalalabad attack and denied responsibility.
