An explosion was heard in the eastern Afghan city of Jalalabad on Wednesday close to foreign consulates including those of India, Pakistan and Iran, witnesses told Reuters.
There was no immediate confirmation of the cause of the blast or of any casualties or damage.
There have been several bomb blasts in Afghanistan over recent weeks at a time when efforts are underway to restart a peace process with the Taliban and ease diplomatic tension between Pakistan and India.
Afghanistan police on Tuesday said Pakistani military officers were involved in the attack on the Indian Consulate in Mazar-e- Sharif in which assailants attempted to storm the mission building.
“We saw with our own eyes and I can say 99% that those attackers were from Pakistani military and used special tactics while conducting their operation,” Sayed Kamal Sadat, police chief of the Balkh province, said of the attack that took place last week.
Sadat said the attackers — officers from across the border — were well-trained military men who fought Afghan security forces in the 25-hour siege. “The attackers were military personnel. They were educated and well prepared and had intelligence. They fought us and only by Allah’s grace were we able to control them and eliminate them.”
This is the latest in a series of blasts near Indian consulates in Afghanistan. On January 5, an explosion took place 400 metres away from the Indian Consulate in Afghanistan’s Jalalabad city, two days after the country’s mission was attacked by terrorists in Mazar-e-Sharif.
