PESHAWAR: The death toll in the overnight attack on a mosque in Pakistan’s militancy-plagued North West Frontier Province (NWFP) rose to at least 25 people, officials said yesterday.
The attackers targeted the packed mosque in Maskani area of Dir district late Wednesday night as locals offered special prayers in the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan.
They first lobbed at least three hand grenades over the parameter wall and then fired volleys of shots at the people, including children, as they fled the mosque in panic. “The official death toll has reached 25 while around 50 people have been wounded,” the local mayor, Bahadur Khan, said. According to Khan, some of the injured were still in critical condition because of multiple bullet and shrapnel wounds.
Dir police chief Fida Hasan Shah earlier said 14 people were killed and 35 wounded. He said the death toll could go up. No one claimed responsibility for the attack, but it is suspected that it came as fallout from continuing military operations against insurgents in the adjoining districts. Dir borders the tribal district of Bajaur close to the Afghan frontier.
Pakistani security forces with artillery and helicopter gunship cover on Wednesday killed more than two dozen rebels in a major advance on their stronghold in Bajaur. More than 600 militants have been killed during the month-long clashes. Chieftains in Dir also blasted the pro-Taleban fighters a few weeks ago for the growing violence in the north-western regions and vowed to fight them off by arming groups of locals.
Meanwhile, Hangu district Mayor Khan Afzal yesterday said that militants have beheaded two of about two dozen police recruits abducted in a tribal region in northwestern Pakistan. He said the slain recruits were among 25 snatched last week while heading to Hangu to attend classes at a training college. Afzal said residents found bodies of the men in an open area of Orakzai town.
The incident comes as Pakistan’s new government is stepping up a military campaign against militants in parts of the northwest, which is believed to be home to safe havens for Taleban and Al-Qaeda-linked insurgents.
