ISLAMABAD, PAKISTAN – An explosion targeting a vehicle carrying coal miners in southwestern Pakistan killed at least 11 people and injured six others, authorities said Friday.
The blast, caused by an improvised explosive device, occurred in the Harnai district of Balochistan, a region long plagued by violence.
“A roadside bomb was planted and detonated as the miners’ vehicle passed by,” a local official said.
RELATED NEWS : Suicide attack on bus in southern Pakistan kills 3, injures 6
Security forces arrived at the scene, cordoning off the area after transporting the victims to medical facilities, Geo News reported. Some of the wounded were in critical condition, and arrangements were being made to transfer them to Quetta for treatment.
The explosion is the latest in a series of bombings in the Shahrag area, home to several coal mines. However, officials described the casualties from this attack as the highest in recent incidents.
The provincial mining authority said most of the miners killed and injured in the attack were from Swat and Shangla districts. No group has claimed responsibility for the bombing. The official, who declined to be identified, added that it may have been a remote-operated device.
No group has claimed responsibility for the attack. But the proscribed terrorist group Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) has carried out similar attacks in the past to target migrant workers from other parts of the country.
The region’s deputy commissioner, Hazrat Wali Agha, said 17 miners were in the truck when the bomb went off.
A doctor at the local hospital said two of the wounded are in critical condition.
Mineral-rich Balochistan, which borders Iran and Afghanistan, has been the scene of a decade-old insurgency by separatist ethnic Baloch groups. Other terrorist groups are also operating in the area.
SOURCE : REUTERS | Follow Us: Facebook | Instagram | Twitter | Youtube |
