The attacker struck the Civil Hospital in Quetta where mourners had gathered after the shooting of Bilal Anwar Kasi; police says 8 kgs of explosives was strapped on vest
Pakistani lawyers and local media personnel carry a bed to move the body of a news cameraman after the explosion
Karachi: At least 75 people were killed and over 120 others injured when a Taliban suicide bomber struck mourners, mostly lawyers and journalists, at a government hospital in Pakistan’s restive southwestern Balochistan province.
Pakistani lawyers and local media personnel carry a bed to move the body of a news cameraman after the explosion. Pic/AFP
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The bomber struck the Civil Hospital in Quetta where the body of president of Balochistan Bar Association (BBA), Advocate Bilal Anwar Kasi — who was shot dead earlier in the day — was being brought. Gunfire followed the explosion as over 200 lawyers and journalists had gathered at the emergency department where Kasi’s body was brought.
The police said that since there was no crater at the site, it was a suicide attack where eight kgs of explosives were strapped on a vest.
A spokesman for Jamaatul Ahara, a faction of Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, said that his faction “accepts responsibility” for the attack and vowed more attacks “until the imposition of an Islamic system in Pakistan”.
A contingent of Frontier Corps and police arrived and cordoned off the hospital following the blast.
Yesterday’s suicide attack appeared to target Kasi's mourners, Anwar ul Haq, a spokesman for the Baluchistan government, said. It is the second deadliest in Pakistan this year so far, after a bombing in a crowded park in Lahore over Easter killed 75.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and President Mamnoon Hussain strongly condemned the attack. Sharif ordered the provincial government to arrest the culprits.
“No one will be allowed to disrupt the peace of the province,” Sharif said.
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