QUETTA: The bodies of 24 pilgrims killed in suicide attacks and firing at two hotels in the border town of Taftan were brought to Quetta by helicopters on Monday.

The dead included 13 men, 10 women and a child. Eighteen people were injured in the Sunday night attack.

Three of the bodies were handed over to their families in the city’s Hazara Town.

They were buried in Hazara graveyard in the presence of a large number of people. They belonged to the Shia Hazara community and worked in one of the hotels which came under the attack.

Twenty-one bodies were taken to their native town of Hangu in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in a C-130 plane.

Chaghi Deputy Commissioner Saifullah Khetran said the death toll rose to 24 after one of the injured died in Taftan hospital on Monday morning. He said that 14 of the seriously injured people, including seven women, had been shifted to Quetta.

“FC helicopters airlifted the 14 injured to the Combined Military Hospital in Quetta,” the Frontier Corps spokesman said, adding that four injured were under treatment in Taftan.

A Correspondent adds: National Party’s acting president Senator Mir Hasil Bizenjo condemned the attacks on the pilgrims and at Karachi airport and demanded immediate action against terrorists to establish the writ of the government.

Speaking at a press conference where former chairman of the Baloch Students Organisation (Pujar) Amin Jan and others announced joining the National Party, Mr Bizenjo said the nation should unite in the fight against terrorism and extremism.

He said attacks on security forces and installations would not be tolerated and retaliatory action in defence and for protecting the life and property of people should not be described as operation.

He said efforts were being made to hold talks with militants in Balochistan to strengthen the political system in the province. But he maintained that the result of negotiations between the government and militants depended on the positive attitude from both sides.

The NP leader rejected a perception that the coalition government in Balochistan was powerless and said it determined policies for all departments, including security forces.

Published in Dawn, June 10th, 2014