Saif-Ul-Islam & Nader Buneri
HANGU/PESHAWAR – As many as 20 persons, including two women and three policemen, were killed and 16 others got seriously injured when a suicide bomber rammed his explosive-laden vehicle into a hospital in Pass Kalay area of district Hangu on Friday.
Sources said that the suicide bomber blew up his explosive packed tractor in front of the newly under construction Zohra Hospital in Pass Kaly village. The blast caused severe fear and panic among the masses, besides jolting the entire area and damaging around six houses.
Soon after the blast rescue teams rushed towards the site and retrieved the dead and the injured from the blast site. They were shifted to District Headquarter Hospital, Hangu, while seriously injured persons were shifted to Lady Reading Hospital Peshawar.
Police, bomb disposal squad and army personnel also rushed towards the site and cordoned off the area.
Talking to media persons, District Police Chief Abdul Rashid confirmed that it was a suicide blast.
He said that the hospital was being run by a private Shiite Muslim trust, which also operated a nearby Shiite mosque and seminary.
Just two days before a teenage suicide bomber killed 17 people at a busy market in Kohat, which neighbours Hangu.
One of the prominent social and political figures Syed Hussain Ali Shah told The Nation that there were threats that militants would target the hospital and Imambargah and they had appraised police in this regard. It appears to be a sectarian attack, he added.
District Hangu is one of the sensitive areas as it is attached with three tribal agencies including Kurram, North Waziristan and Orakzai.
Reuters adds: Officials said Shiite Muslims were praying in a room inside the hospital when the bomb exploded in the town of Hangu. Several police officials said the bomber drove the tractor into the hospital in Hangu.
They said three policemen were among the dead.
PakistanÂ’s US-backed government faces Taliban insurgents who have sustained a campaign of suicide bombings in defiance of a series of military offensives launched last year against their strongholds in the northwest.
Pakistan has been bracing for sectarian violence during Muharram, which began on Wednesday last. Sunni militant groups often attack Shiite gatherings during this period. There have been several sectarian attacks and clashes in Hangu in recent years.
PakistanÂ’s government, which Washington sees as a vital ally in its war against militancy, faces a growing threat from what officials and analysts call a growing nexus of militant groups.
ItÂ’s a murky mix that includes al Qaeda, Pakistani Taliban militants and other groups. Some are anti-Western while others are driven mostly by sectarian hatred. Wednesday, a suicide bomber blew himself up beside a minibus in the nearby town of Kohat, killing at least 16 people, officials said.