Three children among five killed in school bus attack in Pakistan's southwest
KARACHI: The Pakistani military said on Wednesday five people including three children were killed in a militant attack on a school bus in Pakistan's southwestern Balochistan province, with a government official saying the bus had been en route to an army-run school.
Around 40 students were on the bus headed to a military school and several had been injured, Yasir Iqbal, the administrator of Khuzdar district told media.
The attack took place in Khuzdar, the military said, blaming 'Indian terror proxies.'
'As per the initial reports, three innocent children and two adults have embraced martyrdom and multiple children have sustained injuries,' the army's statement said.
Tensions between nuclear-armed neighbors Pakistan and India are high after they struck a ceasefire on May 10 following the most intense military confrontation in decades.
Both countries accuse the other of supporting militancy on each other's soil — a charge both capitals deny.
The latest military escalation, in which the two countries traded missile, drones and artillery fire, was sparked after India accused Pakistan of supporting militants who attacked dozens of tourists in Indian-administered Kashmir on April 22, killing 26. Islamabad denies involvement.
'After having miserably failed in the battlefield, through these most heinous and cowardly such like acts [attacking school bus], Indian proxies have been unleashed to spread terror and unrest in Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhawa,' the army said, referring to two Pakistani provinces.
New Delhi has not yet commented on the accusations.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack but suspicion is likely to fall on separatist groups such as the Balochistan Liberation Army, which in March blew up a railway track and took passengers from a train hostage, killing 31.
Southwestern Balochistan is Pakistan's largest province by area, but smallest by population and most impoverished. The region of some 15 million people is home to key mining projects and a deep seaport that China is building, but has been roiled by a decades-old insurgency.
'Targeting innocent children is a barbaric act, those responsible deserve no leniency,' Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi said in a statement, describing the attack as a 'vile conspiracy to destabilize the country.'
Wednesday's attack was reminiscent of one of the deadliest militant attacks in Pakistan's history when over 130 children were killed in a military school in the northern city of Peshawar in 2014. That attack was claimed by the Pakistani Taliban group.
With inputs from Reuters
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