Afghan man convicted in Kabul airport bombing conspiracy

Alexandria: An alleged Islamic State group militant was convicted on Wednesday, April 29, of a conspiracy charge in a deadly suicide bombing at a Kabul airport during the U.S. military’s chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021.

Mohammad Sharifullah faces a maximum prison sentence of 20 years after his one-count conviction in an international terrorism case that President Donald Trump heralded last year during a speech to a joint session of Congress. Sharifullah didn’t testify at his weeklong trial.

Approximately 160 Afghans and 13 U.S. service members were killed in the Aug. 26, 2021, attack at the airport, where U.S. troops were conducting an evacuation operation when a lone suicide bomber detonated an improvised explosive device near an entry point known as Abbey Gate.

A federal jury in Virginia convicted Sharifullah of providing material support to an Islamic State regional branch known as ISIS-K. But the jurors deadlocked on whether any deaths at the airport “resulted from” that conspiracy. Sharifullah could have faced a possible life sentence if the jury had unanimously decided that question.

Sharifullah didn’t appear to have any visible reaction to the verdict. U.S. District Judge Anthony Trenga didn’t immediately set a date for Sharifullah’s sentencing.

Defense attorney Lauren Rosen argued that prosecutors failed to present any evidence tying Sharifullah to the bombing besides his own words during hours of FBI questioning. Rosen said Sharifullah told FBI agents what he thought they wanted to hear, possibly because he was afraid of being tortured in Pakistani custody before he was brought to the U.S.

“The problem was, he didn’t know much about what actually happened that day,” Rosen told jurors during the trial’s closing arguments. “The government has told you nothing about how this attack actually happened.”

Justice Department prosecutor Ryan White said Sharifullah played a crucial role in planning the Abbey Gate bombing and was involved in several other attacks by ISIS-K, including its March 2024 attack at a Moscow concert hall that killed roughly 140 people.

“The defendant thought nothing of killing,” White said. “For him, it was just another day at the office.”

A review by U.S. Central Command found that the Abbey Gate bomber was Abdul Rahman al-Logari, an Islamic State group militant who had been released from an Afghan prison by the Taliban. Sharifullah recognized the alleged bomber as an operative he had known while incarcerated, according to an FBI affidavit.

A former Marine testified to Congress that he and others had spotted two possible suspects behaving suspiciously on the morning of the bombing but didn’t get permission to act. However, the Central Command review concluded that the snipers hadn’t seen the actual bomber and that the attack was not preventable.

A prosecutor assigned to the Abbey Gate case was fired last year after a right-wing commentator publicly criticized him over his work during President Joe Biden’s Democratic administration. Michael Ben’Ary’s ouster was part of a broader purge of Justice Department veterans deemed to be insufficiently loyal to Trump, a Republican.