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The
Taliban claimed responsibility for killing Dawa Khan Menapal,
head of the Government Media and Information Centre (GMIC). An
official in the federal interior ministry said that "the savage
terrorists killed" him during Friday prayers.
"He (Menapal) was a young man who stood like a mountain in the
face of enemy propaganda, and who was always a major supporter
of the (Afghan) regime," said Mirwais Stanikzai, a spokesperson
of the interior ministry.
Menapal had also served as a spokesperson in Afghan President
Ashraf Ghani's outreach team.
The assassination was the latest in a series conducted by the
hardline Islamist group to weaken Ghani's democratically
elected, western backed regime.
Scores of social activists, journalists, bureaucrats, judges and
public figures who were fighting to sustain a liberal Islamic
regime have been killed by Taliban fighters in a bid to silence
voices of dissent in the war-torn country.
A Taliban spokesperson said Menapal was "killed in a special
attack by the Mujaheedin (Taliban fighters) and was punished for
his actions."
In a tweet, U.S. Charge d'Affaires Ross Wilson said he was
saddened and disgusted by the killing of Menapal, who he called
a friend and colleague whose career was focused on providing
truthful information to all Afghans.
"These murders are an affront to Afghans’ human rights & freedom
of speech, " he said.
On Tuesday, the district governor of Sayed Abad district in
Maidan Wardak province was also assassinated in Kabul by Taliban
fighters.
(Reporting by Kabul bureau; Editing by Toby Chopra, William
Maclean)
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