Blast kills at least 10, wounds 'many'

pulse

May 12, 2017 1:23 PM

The blast in Mastung district struck a vehicle carrying senate deputy chairman Maulana Abdul Ghafoor Haideri.

Pakistani security officials examine the site of a powerful explosion near Quetta on May 12, 2017

A "huge" explosion in Pakistans restive southwestern Balochistan province that apparently targeted a top officials convoy killed at least ten people and wounded "many" others, police told AFP Friday.

The blast in Mastung district, roughly an hour east of provincial capital Quetta, struck a vehicle carrying senate deputy chairman Maulana Abdul Ghafoor Haideri, he told reporters.

"I am alive, Allah has saved my life, it was a sudden blast, broken pieces of the windscreen hit me, I am injured but safe. The driver and other people sitting next to me were badly injured," Haideri said on private TV channel SAMAA.

Police official Safar Khan told AFP at least ten people had been killed and "many injured", with the death toll confirmed by a second police official.

"It is not yet clear whether it was a planted bomb or a suicide attack," Khan said. No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack.

Pakistan has been battling Islamist and nationalist insurgencies in mineral-rich Balochistan since 2004, with hundreds of soldiers and militants killed in the fighting.

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