US jury convicts Sharifullah linked to 2021 Kabul airport attack

A US federal jury convicted an Afghan man on Wednesday of providing support to the Daesh in Afghanistan but failed to agree on whether he was involved in the deadly 2021 suicide bombing at Kabul airport.

Mohammad Sharifullah, a member of the Daesh-Khorasan, was convicted in Virginia of conspiracy to provide material support to a terrorist organisation.

President Donald Trump, in an address to Congress last year, had described Sharifullah as the “top terrorist responsible” for the Kabul airport attack that killed at least 170 Afghans and 13 American troops.

The jury found Sharifullah guilty of providing support to Daesh but deadlocked after two days of deliberations on whether he played a role in the Kabul airport suicide bombing.

According to prosecutors, Sharifullah scouted out the route to the airport where the suicide bomber later detonated his device among packed crowds trying to flee days after the Taliban seized control of Kabul.

The United States withdrew its last troops from Afghanistan in August 2021, ending a chaotic evacuation of tens of thousands of Afghans who had rushed to Kabul’s airport in the hopes of boarding a flight out of the country.

Sharifullah was extradited to the United States in March 2025 and put on trial in Alexandria on the outskirts of the US capital.

He faces up to 20 years in prison.

According to the US authorities, Sharifullah was involved in a number of Daesh-Khorasan attacks between 2016 and his arrest by Pakistani authorities in 2025.

They included a June 2016 suicide bombing that targeted Nepali security guards protecting the Canadian embassy in Kabul.

Sharifullah was accused of conducting surveillance and transporting the suicide bomber to the attack site.

He was also accused of giving weapons instructions to Daesh-Khorasan gunmen who attacked the Crocus City Hall near Moscow in March 2024.