Taliban’s Easter Bombing Targets Christians, Kills 67 in Pakistan

Local Editor

A splinter group of the Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility for a deadly attack on Easter Sunday, saying it intentionally targeted Christians.

The suicide blast in the eastern Pakistan city of Lahore killed at least 67 people and injured more than 300 others, a local government spokesman reported, adding that many of the victims were women and children.

The explosion ripped through the heart of Lahore on Sunday evening, at a time when many families were at the city's Gulshan Iqbal Park to celebrate the Easter holiday.

After claiming responsibility for the explosion, Ehsanullah Ehsan, a spokesman for the Pakistani Taliban known as Jamat-ul-Ahrar vowed such attacks would continue.

Eventually, Pakistani Prime Minister Mohammad Nawaz Sharif strongly condemned the blast.

For his part, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has worked to thaw the icy relations between the two neighbors, called Sharif on Sunday to express his grief and solidarity with Pakistan over the bombing.

In March last year, suicide bombers attacked a Christian community, also in Lahore, setting off two blasts that killed at least 14 people and wounded dozens more, officials said.

The Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility for that attack too and warned of more to come.

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team