Deadly Suicide Attack Targets Pakistani School

PESHAWAR, Pakistan -- A suicide bomber has blown himself up outside a government school in northwest Pakistan, killing a teenage boy and another person.

RFE/RL's Radio Mashaal reports that the bombing occurred in the Shi'ite-dominated Ibrahimzai area of Hangu district on the morning of January 6. The banned extremist Sunni organization Lashkar-e-Jhangvi claimed responsibility for the blast.

The group has staged previous attacks against Pakistan's Shi'ite minority.

Hangu district, located in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province, has a history of sectarian violence.

Deadly Blast In Northwest

Elsewhere in Pakistan, at least 10 people are reported to have been killed and nine wounded in an explosion in the northwest of the country.

Women and children are among the dead, officials say.

The blast occurred in the home of a local tribal elder in a remote village in the Khyber tribal district, close to the Afghan border.

Local officials say the the blast is believed to have been accidental and came from an artillery shell that was stored in the house in the village of Dars in the Tirah Valley.

The area where the explosion occurred is controlled by the Lashkar-e-Islam militant group and was the scene of fierce fighting last year between the Pakistani military and Taliban militants.


With reporting by AFP and dpa