A bomb explosion at a railway station in the city of Quetta, Pakistan, killed at least 24 people and injured 40, local police reported.
Quetta is the capital of the southwestern Balochistan province Pakistan. Separatists fighting for the province's autonomy claimed responsibility for the attack.
– Initially, we thought that an explosive had been planted in the abandoned luggage, but now we think it was a suicide attack, said police officer Mohammed Baloch in an interview with AFP.
Target – a unit of the Pakistani army
The Balochistan Liberation Army, which claimed responsibility for the attack, said in a statement that “the target was a Pakistani army unit” that was returning from military training and waiting for a train on the platform.
Balochistan is the largest and one of the poorest provinces in the country. The situation there has been unstable for decades. In the opinion of the minority living there, the authorities in Islamabad are neglecting the province where they are extracting mineral resources in cooperation with China. The BLA and several other armed groups are fighting for independence there, also using terrorist methods.
Main photo source: PAP/EPA – Fayyaz Ahmed