QUETTA, Pakistan (AP) 鈥 A suicide car bomber struck a school bus in southwestern Pakistan on Wednesday, killing five people 鈥 including three girls 鈥 and wounding 53 others, mostly children, officials said, the latest attack in tense Balochistan province.
The province has been the scene of a , with an array of separatist groups staging attacks, including the outlawed Balochistan Liberation Army, or BLA, designated a terror group by the United States in 2019.
A local deputy commissioner, Yasir Iqbal, said the attack took place on the outskirts of the city of Khuzdar as the bus was taking children to their military-run school.
No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack but suspicion is likely to fall on ethnic Baloch separatists, who frequently target security forces and civilians.
Pakistan鈥檚 Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi called the perpetrators 鈥渂easts鈥 who deserve no leniency, saying the enemy had committed an act of 鈥渟heer barbarism by targeting innocent children.鈥
Officials initially reported that four children were killed but later revised the death toll to say two soldiers were among the dead. Several children were listed in critical condition.
Blaming India
The military in a statement called the bombing 鈥測et another cowardly and ghastly attack,” allegedly planned by neighboring India and carried out by “its proxies in Balochistan.鈥
There was no immediate comment from New Delhi.
Most attacks in the province are claimed by the BLA, which Pakistan alleges has India’s backing 鈥 claims that India denies.
Pakistani Prime Minister also blamed India, without providing evidence.
鈥淭he attack on a school bus by terrorists backed by India is clear proof of their hostility toward education in Balochistan,鈥 Sharif said.
Later, Sharif traveled to Quetta, Balochistan’s capital, to meet with wounded people.
Pakistan regularly accuses India, its archrival, for violence at home. Accusations have intensified in the wake of amid a cross-border escalation over the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir, divided between the two but sought in its entirety by each.
That escalation raised fears of a broader war, and during this period the BLA appealed to India for support. India has not commented on the appeal.
A vicious insurgency
Though Pakistan鈥檚 largest province, is its least populated. It鈥檚 also a hub for the country鈥檚 ethnic Baloch minority, whose members say they face discrimination by the government.
Earlier this week, the BLA vowed more attacks on the 鈥淧akistani army and its collaborators鈥 and said its goal is to “lay the foundation for a peaceful, prosperous and independent Balochistan.鈥
Militant groups are also active in the Balochistan. Though it is unusual for separatists to target school children in the province, such attacks have been carried out in the restive northwest and elsewhere in the country in recent years.
Most schools and colleges in Pakistan are operated by the government or the private sector. The military also runs a significant number of institutions for children of civilians and of serving or retired army personnel.
In 2014, the Pakistani Taliban carried out the country鈥檚 deadliest school attack on an army-run institution in the northwestern city of Peshawar, killing 154 people, most of them children.
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Ahmed reported from Islamabad.
