KARACHI: A car bomb exploded outside a secular party’s election office here late yesterday killing six people, officials said, the latest violence ahead of historic polls next month.
The bomb went off close to the election office of a candidate for the Pashtun-dominated Awami National Party in the city’s western neighbourhood of Mominabad, local police officer Mohammad Khan said. It was an improvised explosive device planted in a Suzuki car, police spokesman Imran Shaukat said.
“Six people have died and more than a dozen are wounded,” senior police officer Aslam Pechuho said.
The blast was heard several kilometres away and damaged nearby shops and houses, witnesses said. “The target was the election office of the ANP whose candidate Bashir Jan was to address a corner meeting” in the impoverished area which is home to many ethnic Pashtuns, police officer Khan said.
The blast was the second to hit Karachi in less than 24 hours. Five people were killed on Thursday when a bomb exploded outside the office of secular Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) party, police said.
The ANP and MQM were coalition partners in the outgoing Pakistan People’s Party-led government and have been been threatened by the Taliban for backing military operations against the Islamists. The three parties are perceived as secular.
AFP
