Suicide bomber kills at least 50 at Pakistan hospital

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Reuters:

Gul Yousafzai

August 8 2016

 

QUETTA, Pakistan A suicide bomber in Pakistan killed at least 50 people and wounded dozens more in an attack on mourners gathered at a hospital in Quetta, according to officials in the violence-plagued southwestern province of Baluchistan.

 

The bomber struck as more than 100 mourners, mostly lawyers and journalists, crowded into the emergency department to accompany the body of a prominent lawyer, who had been shot and killed in the city earlier in the day, Faridullah, a journalist who was among the wounded, told Reuters.

 

Sarfaraz Bugti, the provincial home minister, said at least 50 people were killed, and more than that number were wounded, as the casualty toll spiked from initial estimates.

 

"There are many wounded, so the death toll could rise," said Rehmat Saleh Baloch, the provincial health minister.

 

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The Latest: Death toll in Quetta suicide bombing reaches 63
Associated Press
8/8/16

QUETTA, Pakistan (AP) — The Latest on the bombing at a hospital in the southwestern Pakistani city of Quetta (all times local):

4:05 p.m.

A Pakistani doctor says the death toll from the suicide attack on a hospital in the southwestern city of Quetta has further increased to 63.

Abdul Rehman, the director of the Quetta Civil Hospital, says they are also treating 92 wounded people following the explosion at the state-run hospital.

He says most of the victims of the bombing are lawyers. No group has so far claimed responsibility for the attack in the Baluchistan provincial capital.

 

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You Tube: Moment of Explosion (Suicide Bombing at Civil Hospital in pakistan August 8th, 2016)

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Quetta Hospital Attack: Pakistani Taliban-Linked Jamaat-Ur-Ahrar Claims Responsibility
Pooja Tyagi | Quetta (Pakistan) | Updated: August 8, 2016 7:39 pm

Pakistani Taliban-linked Jamaat-ur-Ahrar claimed responsibility for hospital attack in Quetta that killed over 90 people.

 

A powerful blast ripped through a crowd in a Quetta hospital on Monday killing mainly lawyers, in one of the worst terror attacks in Pakistan this year, officials said.

 

ALSO READ:93 Killed In Blast At Hospital In Pakistani City Of Quetta

 

Balochistan Health Minister Rehmat Baloch had earlier told ARY News that 93 people had died. But he clarified later that the death toll stood at 63 and that the others had been injured, many grievously.

 

Doctors warned that the death toll could rise.

 

The deafening blast, heard clearly on video, took place in the emergency ward of the Civil Hospital when nearly 100 lawyers had gathered to collect the body of a lawyer shot dead hours earlier.

 

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ISIS claims responsibility for Quetta attack
Fayyaz Hussain
August 8, 2016

QUETTA (Web Desk) – Islamic State (ISIS) have claimed responsibility for the blast, which struck at Quetta’s civil hospital on Monday morning.

According to details, a breakaway faction of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has claimed responsibility for the suicide attack, Daily Mail reported.

In a statement, Ahsanullah Ahsan, spokesman for Jamaat-ul-Ahrar militant group, also said their men killed Bilal Kasi, the president of Baluchistan Bar Association, and then targeted the mourners who had gathered at Civil Hospital.

The group has been behind several acts of terrorism in Pakistan in recent years.

The claim could not be independently verified, but local sources have previously reported on the group’s allegiance to ISIS.