Pakistan: Shia pilgrims' bus blast: 2 FC personnel killed in Mastung

The Express Tribune News

A car bomb hit a Frontier Corps (FC) van escorting a bus of Shia pilgrims in Dringarh, Mastung on Saturday, killing two soldiers, officials said. The incident took place on the main Quetta-Taftan Highway in Mastung district, some 50 kilometres southwest of Quetta. “The bomb exploded after an FC vehicle stopped to check a parked car,” Sayed Mehrab Shah, a senior government official in Mastung told AFP. All the pilgrims on the bus, who were on their way to Iran, were safe but several security personnel were wounded by the remotely triggered bomb, Shah said. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the blast but most attacks in the province bordering Afghanistan and Iran have been linked to militant insurgency or sectarian violence. Spokesperson for FC Abdul Wasay confirmed the attack and told AFP that rescue teams had been despatched to the area. Previous attacks On December 30, 2012, a car bomb attack on buses carrying Shia pilgrims to Iran had killed 19 people and injured 25 in Mastung officials had said. The remotely-triggered bomb hit a convoy of three buses in Mastung district and set one of them ablaze, Tufail Baluch a senior government official in the district had said. “The bomb was planted in a car. The condition of some of the injured is critical,” Baluch had said. On September 18, 2012, three people were killed when a blast took place near a bus carrying pilgrims in the Mastung district. Nine people, including three Levies personnel who were escorting the pilgrims, were injured in the incident.