At least three people have been killed and eleven and wounded following a bomb explosion at a luxury hotel in the Pakistani city of Quetta the capital of Balochistan province where the military has been fighting a decade-long low level insurgency.
Correspondents say the Chinese Ambassador to Pakistan is suspected to have been the target of the attack in the car park of the Serena hotel for which the Pakistani Taliban have claimed responsibility.
Azhar Ikram, a senior police official in the city, confirmed the death toll and said that the Chinese ambassador was staying at the hotel, but was not present at the time of the blast.
Pakistan’s interior minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed described the April 21 bomb blast in Quetta, Pakistan as “an act of terrorism”
Resentment has been fueled by billions of dollars of Chinese money flowing into the region through the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor which locals say gave them little benefit as most new jobs went to outsiders.
In recent months, the group, and other militant organisations, have stepped up attacks in tribal areas near the border with Afghanistan.
In 2019 gunmen stormed a luxury hotel overlooking a flagship CPEC project — the deep-water seaport in Gwadar that gives China strategic access to the Arabian Sea — killing at least eight people.
And in June, Baloch insurgents targeted the Pakistan Stock Exchange, which is partly owned by Chinese companies.All the attacks were claimed by the Balochistan Liberation Army .
Discover more from LN247
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
