Blast in Quetta; 15 reported injured

Fifteen people, including at least four policemen, were reported injured in an explosion on Quetta’s Double road, DawnNews reported. Security sources said the blast in Quetta, the capital of Pakistan’s southwestern Balochistan province, occurred when a roadside bomb planted on a motorcycle exploded. Senior police official Wazir Khan Nasir said the bomb was detonated through a remote-controlled device. A rickshaw and shops in the area were reduced to rubble as a result of the explosion. Police and FC personnel had surrounded the site of the explosion which had also caused damage to nearby buildings. The injured were shifted to Civil Hospital Quetta for treatment. Nasir said most of the victims were civilians and that at least two of the wounded are in serious condition. No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack. Pakistan’s southwestern Balochistan province, which borders Iran and Afghanistan, has been wracked by an insurgency waged by ethnic Baloch tribes seeking more political rights and a greater share of profits from the region’s natural resources. Hundreds of people have died in violence ripping through the province since the insurgency flared in late 2004. Scores of people are also alleged to have gone missing in the vast, sparsely populated province since then and their families have accused intelligence agencies of carrying out the abductions. The region has also been hit by attacks blamed on Taliban militants.