PESHAWAR: A bomb targeting a Pakistan air force vehicle ripped through a van in the northwestern city of Peshawar on Wednesday, killing nine people, officials said.

Glass, metal and pieces of human flesh littered the ground near a market on the city’s Kohat road, near the Scheme Chowk area, after the explosion, which investigators said was likely to have been detonated remotely.

“At least nine people have been killed in the blast and 34 others wounded,” senior administration official Javed Marwat told AFP.

The injured were shifted to Lady Reading Hospital.

Shafqat Malik, a senior official with the bomb disposal squad said the blast hit the van as it approached a parked car and appeared to have been targeting a Pakistan Air Force van which was also damaged in the explosion.

“Apparently the bomb was planted in a car parked on the roadside and it contained 30 to 40 kilogrammes of explosives, including artillery shells and ball bearings,” Malik said.

TTP claim responsibility for attack

The TTP spokesman for Tariq Afridi group of Dara Adamkhel Taliban, Muhammad has accepted responsibility for the Kohat Road blast.

Muhammad in a telephone call to media said " We accept  responsibility for the blast on Kohat road its a reaction to the killing of Mualana Naseeb Khan and the PAF jet strikes on a Madrassa in Orakzai Agency."

He said that they were planning more attacks and would also target law enforcement agencies.