“Our hearts go out to the families and other loved ones of more than 60 killed and we wish a speedy recovery to the dozens more injured”.
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Several people were wounded as they rushed to leave the hospital, Dawn reported.
A large group of lawyers was protesting the killing of Bilal Kansi, the leader of the local bar council, at the hospital when the explosion struck. Several injured are under treatment at Quetta’s Combined Military Hospital. The claim could not be independently verified.
Jamaat-ul-Ahrar [The Party of Freedom Fighters] split from the Pakistani Taliban two years ago. Twenty-seven of the critically injured were airlifted to Karachi, where a spokesman for the Aga Khan Hospital said they are “out of danger now”. No group immediately claimed responsibility for the blast.
(AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary). People rally to condemn a bombing in Quetta that killed dozens of people, in Lahore, Pakistan, Monday, Aug. 8, 2016. It remains unclear which group was responsible for the attack.
Ali Zafar, president of the Supreme Court Bar Association of Pakistan, told reporters in the eastern city of Lahore, “We (lawyers) have been targeted because we always raise our voice for people’s rights and for democracy”.
Police cordoned off the hospital following the blast.
The attacker blew himself up in the emergency ward of Civil Hospital, NPR’s Abdul Sattar reports.
When he looked up, Mr Rehman said he saw bodies of the dead and the wounding crying out for help. No one claimed responsibility for the blast.
The attack took place in the country’s western Baluchistan province, which shares a border with Afghanistan and has been plagued by terrorist violence in the past.
Police surrounded the hospital and cordoned off the area.
In September 2014, Jamaat-ur-Ahrar rejected the Pakistani Taliban during a leadership struggle and swore allegiance to Islamic State, also known as Daesh.
Later Monday, the prime minister traveled to Quetta to meet the wounded and assess the situation.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and President Mamnoon Hussain strongly condemned the attack.
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The bomber struck at a time when over 200 mourners had gathered at the government-run Civil Hospital in Quetta where the body of prominent lawyer Bilal Anwar Kasi, who was shot dead earlier in the day, was brought.
