An Afghan Air Force pilot was killed by a bomb in Kabul on Saturday, officials said, in an attack claimed by the Taliban. The pilot, Hamidullah Azimi, died when a sticky bomb attached to his vehicle detonated, with five other civilians getting injured in the attack.
Azimi was trained to operate US-made UH60 Black Hawk helicopters and had served with the Afghan Air Force for almost four years, the force’s commander Abdul Fatah Eshaqzai, told Reuters.
Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Muhajid claimed that the attack was conducted by the Taliban.
Reuters was first to detail a Taliban campaign to assassinate pilot off-base that Afghan officials say took the lives of at least seven Afghan pilots before Saturday’s killing.
The Taliban has confirmed a program that would see US-trained Afghan pilots “targeted and eliminated.”
US and Afghan officials believe it is an intentional effort to destroy Afghanistan’s corps of the US and NATO-trained military pilots as fighting escalates across the war-torn country.
