Death toll from Hangu suicide attack rises to 35

28 dead as explosives-laden vehicle detonated close to administration offices.

HANGU:

The death toll from the Thursday blast in Hangu has risen to 33 people, according to District Police Officer (DPO) Abdul Rasheed.

Express 24/7 correspondent Iftikhar Firdous reported that more than 50 people had been injured in the blast but most had been discharged from the Tehsil Headquarters hospital (THQ).

Updated from print edition (below)

Hangu suicide attack: Answering govt resolve, terror strikes again

In what was the second attack of the day, at least 28 people, including three policemen, were killed and 52 others were injured when a suicide bomber detonated an explosives-laden car close to administration offices in the southern Hangu district of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, officials said.

The attack comes amid a rising spiral of violence that has gripped the country following the killing of al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden on May 2 by US Navy SEALs in Abbottabad.

Earlier in the day, the Taliban fired a mortar bomb at a military checkpoint in North Waziristan but there were no casualties, intelligence officials said.

Commissioner Kohat division Sahibzada Anees told The Express Tribune that at least 26 persons were killed and 36 others were injured in the Hangu blast.

Anees said that three policemen were also among the dead, while six of the injured were in a critical condition. He added that rescue work was in progress and efforts were on to retrieve those trapped beneath the rubble. However, Deputy Inspector General Masood Khan Afridi told AFP that the death toll had risen to 32. According to the news agency District Police Officer (DPO) Abdul Rashid Khan also confirmed the toll and said 56 people were wounded in the attack.

Regional police spokesman Fazal Naeem feared most of those killed were policemen and predicted that the toll would rise, because there are offices and residences of senior police and administration officials near the attack site.

A spokesperson for the Kohat police told The Express Tribune that the attack took place at a police barrier set up close to the residence of the DCO and Hangu City Police Station. He said that the area was very sensitive as the residence of the DCO, District Police Officer (DPO) office, Special Branch office and district courts were all located in the same vicinity.

The official said that all the buildings were badly damaged in the assault, adding the site of the blast, situated on the main Kohat-Hangu Road, is a very congested area.

“A double-cabin pickup was used in this attack and at least 450 kilogramme of explosives were packed inside this vehicle,” another police official told The Express Tribune.

He added that at the moment it was not clear how many buildings were damaged in the blast, which left a four-foot deep and eight-foot wide crater on the ground.

“People were crying and shouting for help. I saw pools of blood and human limbs, including arms and hands,” Haji Abdul Rehman, a witness, told AFP.

“People pulled out bodies of a woman and a man from rubble of a nearby hotel. There are several cars destroyed,” he added.

“We accept responsibility for this attack,” Ehsanullah Ehsan, a spokesman for the Tehreek-i-Taliban, told AFP by telephone. “Soon you will see bigger attacks. Revenge for Osama can’t be satisfied just with small attacks,” he said.

Also on Thursday, the Taliban fired a mortar bomb at a military check post in Miramshah, North Waziristan but there were no casualties, intelligence officials said.

“It missed the post and we have no reports of any casualties,” an intelligence official in the region said.

The main market in the town closed down and security forces fired shots in the air after the attack, residents said.

Earlier on Wednesday, a suicide attack on the CID police station in Peshawar killed at least eight security personnel and injured 46 others, while American consulate personnel were also targeted in a car bomb attack a few days ago.

ADDITIONAL INPUT FROM AGENCIES



Published in The Express Tribune, May 27^th, 2011.