Islamabad, Jan 20, (dpa/GNA) – A bomb planted on a motorbike went off in a busy shopping district in the eastern Pakistani city of Lahore on Thursday, killing three people and wounding scores more, officials said.
The bombing in the metropolis of more than 10 million people is a rarity, but it occurred amid a surge in attacks by the Pakistani Taliban, who allegedly operate from hideouts in neighboring Afghanistan.
There was a child among the dead and at least 26 injured people were taken to hospitals, local administration chief Mohamed Usman Younis said.
The bomb was planted on a motorbike parked outside a shop, police officer Abid Khan said, citing initial investigations.
At least four of the injured were in critical condition, said Iftikhar Ahmed, a doctor at the city’s main hospital.
The violence by the Pakistani Taliban, a separate group from their Afghan counterparts, has surged in recent weeks.
Pakistani Taliban, who are waging an insurgency to implement sharia rule in that country, just as their counterparts did in Afghanistan, have stepped up attacks after the fall of Kabul.
Pakistan’s government on Wednesday raised the security alert across major cities, after the Taliban launched more than a dozen attacks this week.
GNA