A car bomb hit a paramilitary van escorting a bus of Shia pilgrims in Balochistan on Saturday, killing two soldiers, officials said. The incident took place in Dringhar area, on the main Quetta-Taftan Highway in Mastung district, some 50 kilometres south-west of Quetta. "The bomb exploded after a Frontier Corps vehicle stopped to check a parked car," Syed Mehrab Shah, a senior government official in Mastung told AFP.
All the pilgrims on the bus, who were on their way to Iran, were safe but several security personnel were wounded by the remotely triggered bomb, Shah said. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the blast but most attacks in the oil-and gas-rich province have been linked to a decade-long Baloch separatist insurgency or sectarian violence. Abdul Wasay, spokesman for the Frontier Corps confirmed the attack and told AFP that rescue teams had been despatched to the area.