NEW YORK, April 24. /TASS/. Some casualties of the 2021 terrorist attack in Kabul resulted from gunfire, rather than an explosion, according to new video evidence uncovered by CNN, which undermines investigations by the Pentagon.

The terrorist attack killed about 200 people, including 14 US military service members. According to the Pentagon's findings, all people killed in the attack died from the explosion, but CNN found evidence that some of the victims could have been shot dead by gunfire, potentially from US troops.

CNN spoke with some US military personnel, who were on the scene and requested anonymity. One of them said he heard "a mass volume of gunfire" after the blast from where US Marines were standing. This runs counter to US official conclusions that US and UK troops shot just three bursts of fire, which did not hit anyone.

CNN also spoke with an Afghan doctor, who attended to casualties in the wake of the terrorist attack. He said he personally pulled bullets from the wounded, and counted, together with his hospital staff, dozens of Afghans who died from gunshot wounds, not explosion injuries. The doctor said he received a threatening phone call telling him to stop his team from recording the causes of the deaths.

"The new evidence challenges the credibility of the two US military investigations and raises serious questions for the Pentagon, which has continued to dismiss mounting evidence that civilians were shot dead," CNN said.

On August 26, 2021, a suicide bomber detonated an explosive device outside the Kabul airport, which was used by Western countries to airlift their citizens from Afghanistan after the Taliban (banned in Russia) seized control of the country.