Up to 34 people were killed and dozens more were hurt when an explosion ripped through a mosque in Peshawar, Pakistan, where the provincial police force’s headquarters are located.
Police said that up to 350 worshippers were inside the mosque for afternoon prayers when the bomber set off his explosives.
Commissioner Peshawar Riaz Mehsud informed Arab News that 34 people were killed and 150 wounded in the explosion. “Security is probing the blast.”
“We haven’t confirmed how many cops are dead and wounded but I estimate 90% casualties are of police personnel because most of people offering prayers in the mosque were policemen,” Mehsud said.
CCPO Muhammad Ijaz Khan claimed numerous people, including officers, were still trapped under the debris.
Khan said, “We don’t know what caused the explosion yet, but there was a security breach.”
No one said right away that they were behind the bombing, but the Pakistani Taliban have been behind similar attacks recently. Attacks have been on the rise since November, when the Pakistani Taliban broke a truce they had made with the government in May.
Muhammad Asim, a spokesman for the city’s largest hospital, Lady Reading Hospital (LRH), told Arab News that people were still being dug out of the rubble and taken to the hospital, so the number of deaths could go up.
Ahmad Khan, a police officer who was in the mosque when the explosion happened, said that after the explosion, the roof fell down.
Khan said, “It was time for Zuhr (afternoon) prayers.” “When the explosion happened, I was in the second row of worshippers. When the roof of the mosque fell in, many people were trapped inside, but I was able to get out with only minor injuries.
Akbar Khan, who works for the Peshawar charity Edhi, thinks that 50 people, including police officers, are still stuck under the rubble.
Soon after the blast, the provincial health department said that the city’s hospitals were in a state of emergency.
Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif asked people, especially supporters of the party he leads, the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, to give blood to help the people hurt in the suicide attack.
“Get to Lady Reading Hospital in Peshawar and help save precious lives,” he wrote on Twitter.