A suicide bombing outside district court buildings in a residential area of the Pakistani capital Islamabad killed 12 people and wounded 27 on Tuesday (Nov 11), the interior minister said.
The first such attack to hit the city in years sent people fleeing in panic in an area which also houses several government offices.
“At 12:39pm (3.39pm, Singapore time), a suicide attack was carried out at the Kachehri (district courts),” Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi told reporters at the scene of the incident. “So far 12 people have been martyred and around 27 are wounded.”
The blast, which sent people fleeing and damaged vehicles in the area, occurred near the entrance of the Islamabad district court, which is typically crowded with litigants.
The bomber tried to enter the court building on foot, but detonated the device outside, close to a police vehicle, after waiting there for 10 to 15 minutes, Naqvi told reporters.
“We are investigating this incident from different angles. It is not just another bombing. It happened right in Islamabad,” the minister said.
An AFP journalist saw paramilitary troops cordoning off the area where the minister said the assailant detonated the explosives near a police vehicle.
“We are trying to identify who (the attacker) is and where he came from,” Naqvi said.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility, with Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif pinning the blame on “terrorist proxies backed by India”, Pakistan’s longtime foe, without providing evidence.
India’s capital Delhi was hit by a car explosion on Monday, which killed at least eight people.
Sharif accused the Pakistani Taliban militant group and separatists from the country’s Balochistan region, both of whom have carried out attacks mostly targeting the security forces.
In Islamabad, lawyer Mohammed Shahzad Butt said there was a “massive blast”.
“Everyone started running inside out of panic. I have seen at least five dead bodies lying at the front gate,” he told AFP.
Rustam Malik, another lawyer, told AFP he “heard a loud bang at the gate” as he was entering the complex.
“It was complete chaos, lawyers and people were running inside the complex. I saw two dead bodies lying on the gate and several cars were on fire,” said Malik.
Police and paramilitary troops cordoned off the area, which houses several government offices, including the administrative commissioner and deputy commissioner.
Islamabad has largely been spared major militant violence in recent years, with the last suicide attack occurring in December 2022.
The bombing came as Pakistani security forces battled militants who had holed up in a school in northwest Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s Wana district.
“There was an attack in Wana as well last night,” Naqvi said. “Three people died in that attack. The attacker involved in that attack is an Afghan. Afghanistan is directly involved in that attack.”
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