Pakistan church blast kills dozens

BBC News online -- 22 September 2013

Islamists have been blamed for attacks on Christians in the past

 

A bomb blast outside a church in the Pakistani city of Peshawar has killed at least 60 people and injured more than 100 others, officials say.

They say two suicide bombers blew themselves up as people were coming out after Sunday Mass.
The victims were said to include women and children.

Islamist militants have been blamed for previous attacks on Pakistan's Christians, who make up about 1.6% of the country's mainly Muslim population.

 

 

No-one has admitted carrying out the attack.

Witnesses said they heard two blasts, the second more powerful than the first.

About 500 to 600 people were believed to have been inside the church at the time.

Grieving relatives have gathered to identify their relatives.

Many in Pakistan's Christian minority are angry at the country's failure to tackle militancy and extremism, which has claimed thousands of lives within the past decade, says the BBC's Shahzeb Jillani in Karachi.