Just days after arresting 13 police and security officials for negligence caused in the security of Kabul University, Amrullah Saleh, Afghanistan’s first Vice President, ordered their release as the investigation into the attack goes on, TOLOnews reported. 

Relatives and family members of the people killed in the attack also blamed the government for failing to provide security in the university. Just weeks before the attack, Saleh had taken the charge of Kabul’s security.

Those arrested, including the key security officials and the police head of PD 3 district in Kabul, were sent to court on Wednesday on the charges of “negligence” in the security that led to the attack on the university. The six-hour-long attack on Kabul University, which killed 22 people and wounded another 40, was later claimed by Daesh (ISKP) in the same evening. 

The attack sparred a blame game between the Afghan government and the Taliban, with Vice President Saleh leading the charges against the insurgent group. A day after the attack, Saleh directly blamed the Taliban for the attack while the Taliban rejected the claims, calling it a “conspiracy” of the Afghan government to “defame” the group.

Meanwhile US special representative for Afghanistan reconciliation Zamal Khalilzad asked both parties, the Taliban and the Afghan government, not to “score points” against each other using the attack.