QUETTA, July 14: Three children and a man were killed when four houses collapsed after explosives dumped in a house went off in the border town of Chaman on Thursday.

Ten others, most of them children, were injured.

A senior police officer told Dawn that an Afghan national lived in the house and he used it as dumping place for detonators, land mines, rockets, mortar shells and weapons of different calibre.

Police arrested the owner who had rented out the house to Gul Mohammad in Killi Mohammad Rasool area of the town.

Gul Mohammad was also injured in the blasts and escaped from the place.

Mohammad Asghar, a local resident, said that first a powerful explosion took place in the house at around 3:30am and blew up the house. Later, a series of blasts caused fire in the house.

The blasts also destroyed three nearby houses and damaged windowpanes of several other buildings.

Police and Frontier Corps personnel launched a rescue operation and recovered four bodies and 10 injured from the debris.

The injured were admitted to hospitals in Chaman and Quetta.

Bomb disposal personnel said they had defused several unexploded bombs, rockets and mines.

A team of investigation agencies started probe into the blasts.

Police sources said the Afghan national had links with terrorist elements and had stored weapons for subversion.

The owner of the house was shifted to an unidentified place for interrogation.

The deceased, including two girls and a boy, were identified as Bibi Rehmania, Bibi Nasima, Nasibullah and Roohullah.

The injured include Abdul Rehman, Bibi Khiato, Kubra Bibi, Ehsanullah, Habibullah, Karimullah, Hydiatullah, Asadullah, Gul Mohammad and Bibi Zakira.