GWADAR: Armed men attacked the office of the National Party with a hand grenade in Turbat town on Thursday, but it caused no casualties.

Police officials said that the armed men on a motorcycle hurled a grenade at the office of the National Party in Turbat town. The bomb exploded close to the office building, but caused no casualties.

“Fortunately, the hand grenade exploded outside the office, and the party workers, who were sitting inside the office, remained safe,” a senior police officer said.

The bomb blast, however, damaged the walls of the party’s office and shattered windowpanes of the office and nearby buildings.

Police and personnel of Frontier Corps rushed to the site, cordoned off the area and started investigation.

It was the second hand-grenade attack on the National Party’s office in Turbat.

Earlier, the office was attacked during an election campaign of 2013 when the party’s then president Dr Malik Baloch and other leaders were present with the party workers in the office building, but they remained unhurt in the blast.

The central leader of the National Party and provincial Health Minister Rehmat Saleh Baloch condemned the attack on the party office and said that the party leadership and workers would not abandon their peaceful political struggle. “Such terrorist attacks could not force the party to give up its political and democratic struggle at any cost,” he said while talking to newsmen in Quetta.

Published in Dawn, December 15th, 2017