At least 38 killed when gunmen opened fire on vehicles carrying Shiites in northwestern Pakistan

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AP) — Gunmen opened fire Thursday on vehicles carrying Shiite Muslims in Pakistan’s restive northwest, killing at least 38 people, including six women, and wounding 20 others in one of the deadliest attacks in the region of in recent years, police said. .

The attack took place in Kurram, a district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province where sectarian clashes between Sunni Muslims and majority Shiites have killed dozens of people in recent months.

No one immediately claimed responsibility for the latest attack. It came a week after authorities reopened a major highway in the region, which had been closed for weeks after deadly clashes.

Local police official Azmat Ali said several vehicles in a convoy were traveling from Parachinar town to Peshawar, the capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, when gunmen opened fire. He said at least 10 passengers were in critical condition in a hospital.

Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi said at least 38 people were killed in the “terrorist attack.” Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and President Asif Ali Zardari condemned the attack, and Sharif said those behind the killings of innocent civilians will not go unpunished.

Local residents and volunteers gather and await the arrival of victims of gunmen in an incident of firing at passenger vehicles at a hospital in Parachinar, Kurram district of Pakistan’s northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, Thursday, November 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Dilawar Hussain )

Photo: ASSOCIATED PRESS/Dilawar Hussain

A witness, 35-year-old Mir Hussain, said he saw four armed men emerge from a vehicle and open fire on buses and cars.

“I believe other people also shot at the convoy of vehicles from a nearby open agricultural field,” he said. “The shooting lasted about 40 minutes.” He said he hid until the attackers fled.

“I heard women’s cries and people screaming for help,” he said.

Ibne Ali Bangash, a relative of one of the victims, described the convoy attack as the saddest day in the history of Kurram.

“More than 40 people from our community have been tortured,” he said. “It’s a disgrace for the government.”

Baqir Haideri, a local Shiite leader, denounced the attack and said the death toll was likely to rise. He accused local authorities of failing to adequately secure the convoy of more than 100 vehicles despite fears of possible attacks by militants who had recently threatened to attack Shiites in Kurram.

Shop owners in Parachinar announced a strike on Friday to protest the attack.

Shia Muslims make up about 15% of the 240 million people of Sunni-majority Pakistan, which has a history of intercommunal sectarian hostility.

Although they largely live together peacefully, tensions have existed in some areas for decades, especially in parts of Kurram where Shias are the majority. Nearly 50 people from both sides were killed over a land dispute in July, when clashes broke out between Sunnis and Shiites in Kurram.

Initially, clashes between Sunni Muslims and Shiites began in July over a land dispute, but then the long-running dispute turned into sectarian violence, resulting in the deaths of dozens of people from both sides.

Pakistan is tackling violence in the northwest and southwest, where militants and separatists often target police, troops and civilians. Most of the violence in these areas has been blamed on the Pakistani Taliban, a separate militant group but closely linked to Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers, and on separatists in the southwestern province of Balochestan, who are mainly members of the outlawed Baloch Liberation Army.

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Associated Press writers Asim Tanveer, Rasool Dawar and Ishtiaq Mahsud in Multan, Peshawar and Dera Ismail Khan in Pakistan contributed to this report.

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