Blast Kills 43 At Crowded Sufi Shrine in Pakistan
By Ayaz Gul November 12, 2016
The so-called Islamic State terrorist group claimed responsibility for Saturday evening's bomb attack on a crowded Sufi shrine in Pakistan's southwestern Baluchistan province that killed at least 43 people and wounded around 100 others.
Witnesses and doctors feared the death toll was expected to rise.
Hundreds of people were present when the explosion occurred at the shrine about 100 kilometers from Hub, a city on the border of neighboring Sindh province.
The victims include women and children. A local official at the Shah Noorani Shrine said many of the wounded are in critical condition.
Witnesses say that some of the wounded succumbed to their injuries because of absence of a local hospital or medical facility in the remote area.
It took rescue teams hours to reach the scene. Some shrine visitors relied on their personal vehicles to transport the wounded and dead.
Pakistan Army spokesman Lt-General Asim Bajwa says that troops and army medical teams have been dispatched to the scene to help. He said evacuating by air is difficult because there are no landing strips in the area. But he said authorities are looking into sending helicopters Saturday night to transport the victims.
Hundreds of Sufi devotees gather in large numbers at the shrine every Saturday and Sunday to perform special rituals. Those include dancing by women and children who pay tribute to the Sufi saint buried there.
This is the second attack within the past three weeks Islamic State has claimed to have carried out in Baluchistan.
On October 24, three IS suicide bombers raided a police training center in the provincial capital, Quetta, killing more than 62 young recruits and wounding 120 more.
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