At least 11 people were killed in a bomb attack on a bus carrying workers in north-west Pakistan on the border with Afghanistan on Sunday, according to local authorities.
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The workers who were building a new military post for the Pakistan Army were killed on Saturday by a pipe bomb attached to their vehicle, senior North Waziristan official Rehman Gul Khattak said in a statement.
Amir Muhammad Khan, a senior police official in the region, confirmed the bomb blast and the number of casualties to AFP.
“It is heartbreaking to learn of the terrorist attack in North Waziristan that killed 11 innocent workers. “We strongly condemn this senseless act of violence and express our solidarity with the families affected,” Interim Prime Minister Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar said on the social network X (formerly Twitter).
North Waziristan is one of the former semi-autonomous tribal areas in the north-west of the country where the Pakistani army conducted numerous anti-insurgent operations with ties to the al-Qaeda network and the Taliban following the 2001 United States invasion of Afghanistan and its NATO allies.