Several people are feared dead and more than 20 injured after a blast tore through a shuttle train near Chaman Phatak in Quetta on Sunday morning, NewsFirst reported, citing Pakistan’s state-run Associated Press of Pakistan and Dawn News Agency.
State-run APP, citing railway authorities, said the shuttle was running from Quetta Cantonment to the city’s main railway station when it was hit shortly after 8 am local time. The nature of the explosion could not be immediately ascertained.
The explosion derailed three coaches, including the locomotive, while two coaches overturned, APP reported. Security forces immediately cordoned off the area and launched a rescue operation. Pakistan Railways said rescue trucks and a relief train were dispatched to the site.
Railways Minister Hanif Abbasi condemned the attack as a “cowardly act of terrorism” and said it would not weaken the country’s resolve against militancy. Calling those responsible “enemies of humanity”, he said they would be “brought to a disgraceful end”.
Balochistan has seen a sustained rise in attacks on rail and security targets attributed to separatist militants, with previous strikes on the Quetta-Peshawar Jaffar Express and on military convoys raising concerns about the security of the province’s transport corridors.
Source: NewsFirst.
