QUETTA: Three brothers were killed and one of their relatives was injured in a blast caused by an improvised explosive device (IED) in the Duki district of Balochistan on Sunday, police said.

Duki Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Mansoor Ahmed Buzdar said the blast occurred while a pick-up truck was crossing a seasonal stream near the Killi Bakhtair Khan area of Luni tehsil.

“Three brothers and one of their relatives were travelling in a pick-up on their way to their agricultural land in the area when they met the fatal incident,” SSP Buzdar said, adding three brothers were killed on the spot while their relative was injured in the blast.

He said the blast was caused by a remote-controlled IED planted by unidentified miscreants.

Soon after the blast, police and security personnel reached the site and shifted the bodies and injured to the district headquarters hospital, he said, adding that the pick-up truck was destroyed in the incident.

Police said an investigation into the incident was underway.

The incident took place against the backdrop of near-constant terrorist activity and lawlessness in Balochistan.

On August 27, four terrorists belonging to Fitna-al-Hindustan — the term the state has designated for Balochistan-based groups to highlight India’s role in terrorism and destabilisation across Pakistan — were killed in the Sasool area of Balochistan’s Khuzdar district, the military said.

Days earlier, on August 22, a security official embraced martyrdom and six others sustained injuries in a roadside bomb explosion in the Khad Kocha area of the province’s Mastung district.

Two days before that, four labourers were killed and three others injured in a blast in Mastung. The incident occurred in the Garo area of the Khud Kocha sub-tehsil — the same area where the provincial home minister Zia Ullah Langove survived an armed attack earlier this month, in which nine people, including six security guards, were injured.

The Pakistan Institute for Conflict and Security Studies’ (PICSS) monthly security assessment said security situation deteriorated most significantly in Balochistan in the country last month.

The overall death toll increased by 241 per cent in Balochistan, from 109 in June to 372 in July, the report said.

Security personnel deaths in Balochistan increased from six in June to 62 in July, representing a rise of 933pc. Terrorist deaths rose from 75 to 238, while civilian deaths increased by 93pc, from 28 to 54. Eighteen members of peace committees were also killed in the province.