Islamabad mourns victims of Shi’ite mosque suicide bomb
Thousands of people gathered in Islamabad to bury the 31 people who died in a suicide attack on a Shiite Muslim mosque during funeral prayers. Security measures have been increased due to concerns that there may be more attacks in the city.
In Friday’s attack, a man opened fire on the Khadija Tul Kubra Imambargah compound on the outskirts of Pakistan’s capital, then detonated a bomb, killing himself and 31 people and injuring more than 170 others.
The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the attack, the deadliest of its kind in Islamabad in more than a decade, in a statement on the Telegram messaging app.
While bombings are rare in heavily security-locked Islamabad, this is the second attack in three months and has triggered fears of a return to violence in Pakistan’s major urban centers – given that militancy has increased recently.
While security was visibly increased throughout the city on Saturday, police checkpoints were established on all main roads and streets leading to important places. Police and elite commandos stood guard while funeral prayers were performed for some of the victims in an open area near Imambargah.
Information Minister Attaullah Tarar said the government had increased security in Islamabad and would take further steps to ensure it was “flawless”.
The official added that authorities were making progress in tracking down those who facilitated the attacks, without going into further detail.
Shiites, a minority in the predominantly Sunni Muslim country of 241 million, have been targets of sectarian violence in the past, including by the Islamic State and the Sunni Islamist group Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan.
The mass funeral, attended by thousands of people, culminated in mourners beating their chests and then bending over to lift 20 coffins and carry them to the funeral. Many of the mourners wept and wept openly.
Imam Hussein Muqaddasi, who presided over the funeral, said to the mourners, “Whoever committed this terror, may God burn them in hell and turn them to ashes.”
Ashiq Hussain, who lost his 21-year-old niece Mujtaba Ali in the attack, said the family was “torn apart”.
“I want to ask what sin this young man committed so that he died uselessly,” he added.
The injured, some of whom are in critical condition, remain in Islamabad hospitals. Yaqoob Bangash, an official at Islamabad’s largest public hospital, said that major surgeries were performed and minor surgeries were carried out in the hospital.
Bangash, who works at the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences, said the hospital had sufficient resources to cope with the influx of patients following the attack.
According to security sources, law enforcement carried out multiple raids in Peshawar and Nowshera on Friday and four people were arrested in connection with the attack.
Sources said one law enforcement officer was killed and three others were injured during the raids.
A senior security official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media, told Reuters that raids were continuing.
The official added that multiple units participated in the raids and those detained were transferred to a safe location for questioning about the suicide bomber, his handlers and his support network.
Defense Minister Khawaja Asif said in a post on channel X on Friday that the bomber had a history of travel to Afghanistan and accused neighboring India of sponsoring the attack without providing any evidence.
India’s foreign ministry condemned the mosque attack and dismissed allegations of its involvement as “baseless”.
