ISLAMABAD, 22 March 2005 — Eighteen minority Hindus were killed when their temple was hit by rockets during fighting between tribesmen and security forces in a restive tribal town in southwestern Pakistan last week, a government official said yesterday.
Five children and three women were among the victims of last Thursday’s firefights in the flashpoint town of Dera Bugti, said Basant Lal Gulshan, a legislator from the ruling Muslim League party.
Another 30 were injured, Gulshan said. The bodies of 17 were cremated Saturday while a child was buried in line with the Hindu faith, he added.
Full details of the battles have been slow to emerge and it was unclear whether the weapons were fired by the clansmen or by the Pakistani paramilitary forces.
Abdul Samad Lasi, the top government administrator in the area, said yesterday that several homes of Hindus near the temple in Dera Bugti also were damaged by rockets in the fighting.
“This is true that some 18 Hindus were killed and their temple was severely damaged,” Lasi said.
“Both sides were shooting at each other. It is difficult to say whose fire destroyed the temple,” Lasi said from inside a base at Dera Bugti where government officials and paramilitary troops are surrounded by armed tribesmen.
Meanwhile, investigators suspect rebel tribesmen may have been involved in the weekend bombing of a shrine near Quetta that killed 39 people, police said yesterday.
Police have largely ruled out sectarian rivalry and say Saturday’s attack may be linked to the bloody clashes two days earlier between government forces and nationalist clans in the unruly province of Balochistan.
No one has claimed responsibility for the blast.
