Slaughter of the innocents

At least 52 died immediately and over 100 were injured in Shah Noorani shrine blast

The bomber struck in a remote area, almost certainly knowing that this would compound the difficulty of bringing aid to those that survived his actions, and so it proved. At least 52 died immediately and over 100 were injured. The figure for the dead will rise. Those that died were among a crowd of devotees performing a dhamaal or devotional dance at a Sufi shrine, by no means the first time that pacifist Sufis have been attacked and likely not the last. It is being reported that the suicide bomber was a teenager between 14 and 16 years, and also reported that this latest atrocity was being claimed by Islamic State (IS). Neither claim is verifiable but the IS claim comes through Amaq, a news agency to which it claims affiliation.

Speculation, much of it ill-informed, is rife as to who carried out the attack and why – perhaps as a reprisal for the killing of the leader of a banned group in a firefight in Hub last Friday, perhaps as a protest against the CPEC, perhaps as a purely sectarian act and perhaps it was the Indians – but the fact is that nobody knows and unless the security agencies get very lucky and capture alive one of those that planned and resourced the attack we may never know.



Balochistan has been the target several times this year. It is vast, thinly populated and home to any number of separatist and nationalist groups as well as the proxies and surrogates of organisations that are at least theoretically banned in Pakistan. In many instances they are ‘banned’ in name only and operate openly holding rallies and collecting funds. If the government wanted to convince us of its seriousness in terms of controlling banned organisations then ‘banned’ should be shown to mean ‘banned’ not some betwixt-and-between status that allows religious feathers to go unruffled. Yet again innocent people have been blown to bloody fragments, men women and children obliterated. Fatuous platitudes and empty condolences from on high will not repair ruined lives. Sadly, our expectation that anything will change as a result remains depressingly low.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 14^th, 2016.

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