Presidential candidate Ahmad Wali Massoud on Sunday called on the Afghan government to declare Monday 19 August a day of national morning in honor of those killed in a suicide attack at a wedding hall in Kabul. 
 
Mr. Massoud who is competing incumbent President Ashraf Ghani in the September elections said that the present government has failed to provide security to the Afghan people. 

He said the government should delay Afghanistan’s 100th Independence Day celebrations in the wake of the fragile security situation of the country. 
 
Mr. Massoud called the attack a crime against humanity and asked Ghani to respond to the public. 
 
“Our celebrations and Independence Day remain in place, but let's announce tomorrow a day of the national morning to honor the martyrs. It should not be in a manner that on one side we see families of the martyrs crying and bleeding, but on the other side, we dance. This is totally in contrast,” said Mr. Massoud.
 
Political commentators meanwhile said that there is a possibility that the Taliban or its associate groups carried out the attack. 
 
“It is possible that some other groups carried out the attack to inform the Americans that we are also there to share the cake that you are going to divide, but at the same time, there is another possibility that some elements inside the country did this to show to the Americans and the world mindset that you are sealing an agreement with those who kill the people at wedding ceremony and funerals,” said MP Ramazan Bashardost.
 
“Basically, religious radicalism and extremism is a long-term threat to our country. The Taliban can be behind the attack as the main perpetrators and deny the link to the attack to avoid a negative impression on the peace talks, but there is also possible that we are entering into a new phase of bloodshed where other groups such as Daesh and al-Qaeda want to prove their existence to portray that they are present there and can be a major threat,” said political analyst Saleh Mohammad Registani. 
 
The Afghan government has persistently urged the need for a ceasefire to be announced while talking peace with the hardline movement, but the Taliban have categorically said that there is no agreement on a ceasefire in the potential peace agreement with the US. 
 
“It can be foreign or internal hand because we have got enemies for peace inside and outside the country and those who are opposing peace and the current process inside Afghanistan they are being supported from abroad and funded from outside the country,” said political analyst Wahid Muzhda.
 
“The Taliban say that they are talking on two issues. First, the withdrawal of foreigners and assurance that Afghanistan’s soil will not be used as a threat in exchange and the issue of ceasefire comes later,” said a former Taliban commander Sayed Akbar Agha. 
 
Although the Taliban condemned the attack on the wedding ceremony as barbaric and outrageous, many Afghans suggest that the attack had been plotted by the group itself.