At least 28 people were killed and more than 100 others wounded in a bomb blast at a mosque in a security compound in northwestern Pakistan, officials said. It was the worst such attack in almost 11 months.
The explosion in Peshawar took place Monday during afternoon prayers, inside an area where the town’s police headquarters and other government offices are located, Ghulam Ali, the governor of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province told reporters.
“It’s an unfortunate incident,” Ali said. Police are still looking through the debris of the mosque, according to Peshawar’s police chief Mohammad Ijaz Khan.
In March last year, the Islamic State group claimed responsibility for an attack on a Shia mosque that killed more than 60 worshipers.
No group has claimed responsibility for the latest attack, but Pakistan has seen a spike in violence since the Taliban seized power in neighboring Afghanistan. The Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, a militant group with links to the Afghan group, last year ended a cease-fire with the government in Islamabad and announced a resumption of attacks across the nation.
According to the Islamabad-based Pakistan Institute for Conflict and Security Studies, militant violence spiked by 22% in 2022 compared with 2021.