At least 11 people have been killed and 60 were wounded after a Taliban off-shoot attacked a demonstration in Lahore, Pakistan.
The suicide bomber approached the pharmacists on a motorbike and detonated his device as he was passing the marchers.
Hundreds of pharmacists were demonstrating over new laws governing drugs sales when the suicide bomber struck.
At least two senior police officers – including a former provincial counterterrorism chief – were among those killed, according to police spokesman Zaheer Abbas.
Sameer Ahmad, the Lahore deputy commissioner, said at least 11 people were killed and 58 wounded.
A Taliban splinter group called Jamaat-ul-Ahrar claimed the attack in a text message, saying it was revenge for Pakistani military operations against Islamic militants in tribal regions along the Afghan border.
Live TV registered a loud bang and showed smoke and fire billowing up as people ran away, some of them carrying the wounded. ‘We just couldn’t understand what happened,’ Tufail Nabi told local Geo News TV. ‘It was as if some big building collapsed,’ he said as he limped away.
Jamaat-ul-Ahrar is one of several splinter groups from the Pakistani Taliban, which has carried out scores of attacks against security forces and religious minorities. In recent years, Pakistan has had launched several offensives against the Taliban and other Islamic militant groups in the tribal regions.
Police had cordoned off the area on Mall Road, one of the city’s main arteries, as witnesses fled amid fears of a second blast, with images of the injured being carried away shown by local media.
One witness Muhammad Tariq said: ‘The blast was so powerful. I saw the injured and bodies, saw flames surrounding the blast site, people were crying.’
Local politician Rana Sanaulla said the incident occurred as hundreds of chemists protested a new law near the Punjab provincial assembly building.
He added: ‘We fear many injured.’
Lahore, the country’s cultural capital, suffered one of Pakistan’s deadliest attacks during 2016, a Taliban suicide bomb in a park during Easter which killed more than 70, including many children.
But blasts have generally been rare in the teeming city in recent years, as casualties from extremist attacks in Pakistan dropped significantly in 2015 and 2016.
Social media users were quick to suggest the blast was meant to derail plans to hold the highly-anticipated final of the Pakistan Super League in Lahore.
The second year of the Twenty20 tournament is currently being held in the United Arab Emirates out of security fears, but after a military crackdown on extremism officials were confident enough to plan for the final to take place in the cricket-mad city.
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