Suicide blast at local court in Charsadda kills 16
Several nearby vehicles caught fire soon after the explosion.
CHARSADDA (Web Desk) – At least sixteen people including three police constables were martyred and several others were injured in a suicide blast in the premises of a local court in Charsadda district in Pakistan’s troubled northwest, DPO Charsadda Khalid Sohail told Dunya News.
The bomber attacked as lawyers and litigants were arriving during the morning rush hour in the town of Shabqadar.
Sohail Khalid, district police chief in Charsadda district where Shabqadar is located, confirmed the suicide attack and said two of the dead were policemen.
"We are investigating the nature of the blast. According to initial reports, a suicide bomber entered the complex and a policeman on duty tried to stop him but he blew himself up," Khalid said.
Head Constable Mian Naseem Ullah, who tried to stop suicide bomber in Shabqadar (Source: @khalidkhan787 at Twitter)
Several nearby vehicles caught fire soon after the explosion.
Rescue officials and a contingent of security forces arrived at the scene and cordoned off the area. The injured persons were shifted to nearby hospitals.
At least one woman was among the dead and two children were among the injured, police sources said.
DPO Charsadda told that those in critical condition have been shifted to Lady Reading Hospital in Peshawar.
Local bar association president Shair Qadir said they had requested security after receiving threats of the attack, but no action was taken, calling it a "police failure".
Shabqadar is near the Mohmand tribal district, one of seven semi-autonomous regions bordering Afghanistan where militants from Al-Qaeda and the Taliban had established bases in the past.
Shabqadar is some 30 kilometres (18 miles) west of Charsadda, where terrorists attacked Bacha Khan University (BKU) on January 20 in a rampage that left 21 dead.
Among the victims was a chemistry professor who students said fired his own pistol at the militants before he died in a hail of bullets.
Teachers in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province were given permission to carry firearms after the Tehreek-e-Taliban massacred more than 150 people, the majority of them children, at a school in the provincial capital Peshawar in 2014.
Pakistan has been fighting a homegrown insurgency since 2004, when militants displaced by the US-led invasion of Afghanistan began a campaign in border tribal areas.
Three years later the umbrella Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) group was formed.
Overall levels of violence have fallen since a concerted military push against the Taliban’s bases began in 2014, and last year saw the fewest casualties among civilians and security forces since 2007.
But the threat of attacks, particularly on "soft targets" like schools and government offices, remains.
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