3 Chinese injured in Pakistan suicide blast
ISLAMABAD — A suicide attack injured six people, including three Chinese workers, in Pakistan’s southwestern Balochistan province on Saturday, the Chinese Embassy to Pakistan said.
“The Embassy and Consulates General of China in Pakistan strongly condemn the violent attack in Balochistan, and express our sincere sympathy to the injured from both countries,” the Chinese Embassy and the Chinese Consulate General in Karachi said in a statement.
The Chinese side has requested Pakistan to investigate the incident, bring the perpetrators to justice and take further effective measures to ensure the security of the Chinese institutions and citizens in Pakistan, the statement added.
The suicide blast shattered the windows of the bus ferrying the Chinese workers in Dalbandin, about 340 kilometers southwest of the provincial capital of Quetta.
A local administrator of the region, Sardarzada Saif Khaitran, said a suicide bomber exploded his explosives-laden truck near the bus carrying workers from Saindak Copper Gold Mines project to the airport in Dalbandin.
The engineers were working on the Saindak project, Khaitran said, a joint venture between Pakistan and China to extract gold, copper and silver from an area close to the Iranian border.
According to another local official, three Chinese nationals, two security personnel, and a civilian driver of the bus were among the injured.
Stable condition
Personnel of security forces convoy which was providing the security to the bus shifted the injured to the nearby hospital. All the injured are in stable condition.
Muhammad Ibrahim, the driver of the bus, said from his hospital bed that he had averted a major loss by slamming the brakes before the bus hit the attacker’s vehicle.
“The whole bus would have burnt if I had not applied the brakes,” he said.
Images and video of the bus showed its front side damaged by the blast. The driver said that if he hadn’t pressed the brakes the damage to the bus and injuries would have have been far greater.
The security forces cordoned off the area and started a search operation.
The Baluch Liberation Army, a separatist group, claimed responsibility for the suicide attack — the first time any Baluch separatist group has taken responsibility for a suicide attack.
The southwestern province is the scene of a low-level insurgency by Baluch separatists who want a greater share of provincial resources or outright autonomy from Islamabad.
Pakistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs strongly condemned the terrorist attack on the Chinese engineers and their accompanying security personnel.
In a statement, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mohammad Faisal said that all of the injured are stable and being treated.
“Pakistan remains unflinchingly undeterred in the face of such dastardly terrorist acts,” the statement said.