Balochistan firing: 18 killed as van catches fire

Shoot-out at petrol station turns deadly as petrol drums catch fire.


Afp/web Desk November 02, 2012

QUETTA: At least 18 people were killed and several sustained injuries when their van caught fire after a shoot-out at a small petrol pump in Khuzdar, Express News reported on Friday.

Senior local official Abdul Mansoor Kakar told AFP that four gunmen opened fire on the van with automatic rifles, igniting petrol drums by the roadside and triggering a massive inferno.

A number of stalls selling petrol smuggled from Iran were engulfed in the fire, Kakar said, with stallholders among the dead.

"Four attackers riding motorbikes opened fire on these petrol stalls and ran away after the attack," Kakar told AFP.

"At least 18 people have been killed in the fire. The dead included seven women and four children sitting in the passenger van."

Doctor Akbar Harifal, the top administrative official in Khuzdar confirmed the new death toll, which rose sharply from a previous tally of seven.

Eleven of the 18 bodies have been identified, Kakar said, but hospital officials reported that some were burned so badly that recognition was difficult.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack.

COMMENTS (14)

dkk | 11 years ago | Reply

Balochistan is now the second most serious issue of Pakistan(the first being taliban),but is not given adequate attention by media and government alike.What ever the issue might be, it needs to be solved urgently, and i for one think that government and the establishment has the capacity to solve it, all it needs is just the will to start making things better.

lovePak | 11 years ago | Reply

Agree with S K Afridi. A lot about Balochistan goes completely untold. We are told the whole year round that Balochis want freedom, and it's proven wrong on every national holiday. The truth is, Balochis want rights, not an "Azad Balochistan" as the media will have you believe, only 37% of Baloch people and 11% of the Pashtun population want freedom. These are undeniable Gallup poll results. And I quite agree with their demand for more rights.

And yes, the truth is this: When the BLA kills innocent civilians, they're called freedom fighters and when the army kills members of the BLA, they're called occupiers and the terrorists are automatically innocent. I still want an end to the military operation, but the media is playing an extremely negative and demoralizing role here. Every achievement is taunted, and every failure dramatized.

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