Death toll in Karachi blasts rises to 7

KARACHI

By Aamir Latif

The death toll from the twin explosions that rocked northern Karachi on Friday evening has risen to seven.

Earlier in the day, senior police official Fayyaz Khan told Anadolu Agency that five people had been killed and 30 injured, adding that four children were among the dead.

Dr. Omer Khan at the Abbasi Haheed Hospital told AA later that two of the wounded had succumbed to their injuries.

Among those killed was an associate producer of Pakistan's popular Geo TV channel, Salik Ali Jafri, the channel's administration announced.

The bombs, which had been planted in a motorcycle and a rickshaw, were detonated by remote control, Khan said.

The first blast occurred outside a roadside café packed with customers in Karachi's Shiite-dominated Incholi district, killing four.

Within a minute, a second explosion went off outside a bakery some 200 meters away from the first blast site, killing a young boy and injuring a number of others.

Over a dozen shops and a number of vehicles parked in the vicinity were badly damaged while the area was strewn with debris.  

Rescue workers struggled to find and assist survivors despite a power outage that followed the blasts.

Another police official told AA that one of the victim's bodies had been torn apart, raising the possibility of the involvement of a suicide bomber.

"But this is just an idea. Nothing is for sure," he said.

Local Shiite groups, meanwhile, announced a three-day period of mourning for the slain.

"The blasts are aimed at triggering Shiite-Sunni conflict in the country," Allama Nasir Abbas, a leader of Wahdat-e-Muslimeen, an umbrella of various Pakistani Shiite groups, told reporters.

The blasts have fueled already mounting tension between Shite and Sunni groups following clashes earlier this month in the garrison city of Rawalpindi in which 11 Sunni Muslims were killed.

englishnews@aa.com.tr