Deadly Bomb Blasts Rock Pakistan

Posted January 10th, 2013 at 2:40 pm (UTC-5)
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At least 56 people have been killed in a twin bombing in Quetta, just hours after a bombing at the southwestern Pakistani city's market killed 11.

Pakistani police said a suicide bomber detonated his explosives Thursday in a crowded billiard hall in Quetta, the capital of Baluchistan province. About 10 minutes later, a second bomb went off outside the building. More than 100 people were wounded in the twin blasts.

Reports said the blast at Quetta's market earlier Thursday may have targeted paramilitary soldiers. That bombing injured 27 people.

Quetta is the capital of Baluchistan province, which has grappled with a decades-long separatist insurgency, Islamic militancy and sectarian violence.

Elsewhere in Pakistan Thursday, at least 21 people were killed and dozens injured in an explosion in Mingora, the largest city in northwestern Pakistan's Swat province. Police initially said the blast, which took place as people gathered to hear a religious leader speak, was caused by an exploding gas cylinder.

They later confirmed that it was a bombing.