Three killed in Pakistan attack

“The boys, in their twenties, were killed in the shooting while their parents were wounded and a policeman who was passing by the site was also killed after he shot and wounded one attacker”, senior police official Abdul Razzaq Cheema said.

The bomb went off during rush hours in Bach Khan square, the centre of Quetta city where thousands of customers visit the markets daily.

The blast was claimed on Monday by sectarian groups Jaish-ul-Islam and Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, which have flourished in recent years despite being outlawed.

On June 7, unknown assailants killed five people belonging to the Hazara community in Bacha Khan Chowk.

One person died in the explosion while 19 others including three women and two children sustained wounds.

The injured were initially shifted to Civil Hospital and then moved to the CMH for treatment.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack.

At least four people including a policeman were killed and two others injured in two separate incidents of firing in Pakistan’s southwest Quetta city on Monday, local media and police said.

All the three victims belonged to Khanewal district of Punjab.

The desperately poor province is also riven by sectarian strife and Islamist violence in its northern Pashtun belt, with middle-class Baluch increasingly viewing independence as their only hope for a more liberal and secular state.

According to the security sources, the accused are involved in numerous targeted killings and bombings in Quetta.