Provincial Minister in Pakistan Is Killed in Suicide Bombing

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — A senior provincial minister in Pakistan who was at the forefront of the country’s fight against militants and
banned sectarian groups was killed in a suicide bomb attack on Sunday, officials said. At least 10 other people were also said to have been killed in the bombing, and several were reported wounded.

Shuja Khanzada, 72, the home minister of Punjab Province, was holding a political meeting in his home district of Attock early on Sunday when a loud explosion rocked the building, collapsing it and leaving several people, including Mr. Khanzada, under the debris.

A rescue operation was underway to pull out the wounded and the dead, but rescue workers were facing difficulties because of a lack of equipment to clear the wreckage.

Mr. Khanzada, a retired army colonel, was responsible for maintaining law and order in the province. While there was no immediate claim of responsibility for the bombing, officials speculated that it could have been in response to the July 29 killing of Malik Ishaq, one of Pakistan’s most notorious and feared sectarian militants, in a police shootout.

Mr. Khanzada had been receiving death threats from militants, officials said.

At the time of the attack, the minister was also receiving expressions of sympathy from constituents. “People had come to condole the death of one of our uncles, who had died a few days ago,” Jahangir Khanzada, the minister’s son, told local reporters.

Local news media also pointed out that security was lax at the premises. Although there had been reports of death threats to the minister, no security checks were performed on the visitors. The gate of the Khanzada house was always open to the public.

Images broadcast on private television news networks showed rescue workers and army troops scavenging through the rubble to pull out the dead and to look for survivors.

The wounded were ferried to nearby hospitals in Attock and Kamra.

Mushtaq Sukhera, the inspector general of the Punjab police, told reporters in Lahore, the provincial capital, that body parts of the suicide bomber had been recovered from the site.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and the army chief, Gen. Raheel Sharif, strongly condemned the attack and vowed to continue Pakistan’s fight against militancy and extremism.

“Such dastardly, cowardly attempts can’t dent our national resolve to eliminate the menace,” a military spokesman said, quoting the army chief. “Khanzada was a bold officer whose sacrifice for the greater cause of cleansing Pakistan won’t go to waste.”