QUETTA: Two people were killed and three others injured in an improvised explosive device (IED) blast in the Wali Tangi area of Quetta district on Sunday, police said.
According to police, unidentified attackers targeted a vehicle carrying a contractor and four labourers to the area, located around 30 kilometres from Quetta.
Senior Superintendent of Police Asif Ghafoor said the IED had been planted by the roadside and was detonated remotely as the pickup passed through the area.
“Five people, including the contractor, were injured in the blast and shifted to Civil Hospital Quetta,” he said, adding that two of the injured later succumbed to their wounds.
Officials said the contractor was taking the labourers to the area for construction work on tube wells.
The blast badly damaged the vehicle, police officials said, adding that police and Frontier Corps personnel reached the site soon after the explosion, cordoned off the area and shifted the injured to the hospital.
Security forces launched a search operation to trace those involved.
Former Afghan commander shot dead
Meanwhile, unidentified armed men shot dead a former Afghan army commander in Quetta, police said.
The incident took place in Killi Raisani, a locality on the outskirts of the provincial capital.
“Armed men riding a motorcycle targeted the former Afghan commander while he was passing through the area,” Adil Shah, a senior police officer at Shalkot police station, told Dawn.
He identified the victim as Haji Hazrat Ullah alias Rorad Achakzai, a former commander of Afghanistan’s Kandahar province.
According to police, Hazrat Ullah had migrated to Quetta in 2021 and had been living in Killi Raisani since then.
Further investigation was under way.
According to the Pakistan Institute for Conflict and Security Studies’ (PICSS) monthly security assessment released on July 31, the security situation deteriorated most significantly in Balochistan last month.
The overall death toll in Balochistan increased by 241pc, from 109 in June to 372 in July, the report said.