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| The ICRC flag flies at half-mast in Kabul in February after a previous deadly attack on staffers |
A Spanish physiotherapist working for the Red Cross in the northern Afghan city of Mazar-i-Sharif was shot dead on Monday, apparently by a hospital patient, officials said.
Two people have been arrested over the deadly attack, including the 21-year-old shooter who police said was a “regular patient”.
The International Committee of the Red Cross confirmed that the staff member had been killed in its orthopedic center in Mazar-i-Sharif. “We are shocked and devastated,” it said in a statement on Twitter.
Sheer Jan Durani, a spokesman for the police chief in Balkh province, said two patients were admitted to hospital and one took out a pistol apparently concealed in a wheel chair and shot the woman.
Most of the charity’s programmes in the north have been on hold since February, after six Afghan employees of the ICRC were shot dead when their convoy was ambushed in Jowzjan province.
Two of their colleagues were abducted and only released by their captors last week.
No group claimed responsibility for the abduction or killings, but Jowzjan police had blamed local IS jihadists.
