Five policemen among six dead in Quetta suicide attack

QUETTA: Six people including five police officers were killed after a terrorist blew himself up on Zarghoon Road of Balochistan’s Quetta city on Tuesday evening, ARY News reported.

Police sources first said that a terrorist riding a motorcycle blew himself up near the Balochistan Constabulary truck on the city’s busy Zarghoon Road but later retracted their statement by saying that the attacker was on foot.  The huge blast left at large number of police personnel injured, five of them lost their life.

The truck was carrying the police officers who were coming back after performing their duty at Balochistan Assembly building.

Police and rescue agencies soon reached the spot moved the injured to the city’s Civil Hospital. Hospital sources confirmed that five out of the injured succumbed to their wounds.

Banned outfit Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan claimed responsibility for the attack, but the claim has not been independently verified.

President Mamnoon Hussain, Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, Governor Balochistan Muhammad Khan Achakzai, Governor Sindh Muhammad Zubair, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Governor Iqbal Zafar Jhagra and Chief Minister Sindh Murad Ali Shah have strongly condemned the blast.

Balochistan has experienced incidents of violence and targeted killings for over a decade. In recent months, the province has faced a number of security challenges, with security personnel in the province often being targeted in roadside explosions and suicide attacks.

Back in December 2017, a suicide attack on the city’s Bethel Memorial Methodist Church left at least nine people dead and 43 others injured. In November, a police officer lost his life in a gun attack on the city’s Nawan Kali area.

Gunmen kill 60 in attack on Quetta police training center

In one of the deadliest attacks in the city’s history, in October 2016, terrorists wearing suicide jackets killed at least 60 police cadets in an attack on Quetta’s police training center.

Five to six terrorists had stormed into the police training centre at Sariyab Road and targeted at least 60 security officials after taking them hostage under the cover of aerial fire.