Pakistan shrine blast rips apart families
Print Edition
SURVIVORS of a massive bomb attack on a shrine in southwest Pakistan that killed dozens spoke of their horror yesterday after families were ripped apart in a strike showing the expanding reach of the Islamic State group.
The blast, later confirmed to be the work of a teenage suicide bomber, hit male and female worshippers as they were dancing and chanting at the shrine of the Sufi saint Shah Noorani on Saturday, some 750 kilometers south of Quetta, the provincial capital of restive Balochistan province.
Mohammad Shehzad, 25, who had traveled in a group of 120 pilgrims, said: “The pressure of the blast was so strong, people were blown away. Everyone was running, shouting and searching for families. Children were looking for their parents. People looking for brothers and sisters but no one was able to listen to their cries.”
The attack killed 52 and wounded more than 105 and was the fourth deadliest in Pakistan this year. Stricken survivors swathed themselves in blankets and braved the cold under open skies overnight as they made their way home.
Sarfraz Bugti, the province’s home minister, said the blast was carried out by a teenage suicide bomber.
The statement lent credence to a claim of responsibility by the IS, which released a photo overnight of the purported attacker — a dark-skinned youth dressed in white tunic with a green backpack — via its affiliated Amaq news agency.
It was the second major assault claimed by the Middle-East based outfit in as many months, following a raid on a police academy in the same province that killed 61 people.
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