Four foreigners are reportedly among seven people killed when a bomb exploded near a school in Pakistan’s Northwest Frontier Province, but initial reports are contradictory. The bomb may have hit a convoy, in the Lower Dir district, traveling to the opening of a girls school but other reports say the blast came during the opening ceremony of the school. Two of the dead may have been schoolgirls, but it seems clear that many of the nearly 50 injured were students. The BBC reports that the four Westerners killed were aid workers, citing police, but other sources say there were three Westerners and they may have been US soldiers. The district is a Taliban stronghold.
An award-winning journalist from Calgary and four soldiers died in a blast in Afghanistan, in Canada’s third worst day in Afghanistan. Five others, including one Canadian civilian, were injured by the explosion on the edges of the city of Kandahar. “The attack came during a community security patrol to gather information on the pattern of life and maintain security in the area,” reports the CBC. Journalist Michelle Lang had been in Afghanistan only two weeks and was gathering material for a series of articles on the work of Canadian soldiers.
Links to other sites: CBC, Vancouver Sun
A blast in the capital of Somalia, Mogadishu, killed three cabinet ministers and at least 18 other people Thursday 3 December, although AllAfrica, picking up the story from a UN humanitarian newsletter which cites a hospital source, puts the figure at 50 dead. The authors of the crime remain a mystery. A bomb exploded during a medical school graduation ceremony and suspicion quickly fell on an Islamist group, al Shabaab, but the group has denied it was involved. The extremist group has been locked in a power struggle with the Western-backed government, which the extremists accused of masterminding the blast, pointing out that the government itself has deep rifts. The US has called al Shabaab a proxy for al Qaeda in the region and Reuters reports that “Western security agencies say Somalia has become a safe haven for militants, including foreign jihadists, who are using it to plot attacks across the impoverished region and beyond.”
Update 18:10 Syrian Interior Minister Said Mohammad Sammour has said on Syrian state television that there was no bomb and that the explosion was due to overinflated tires on the bus, Al-Jazeera reports. He categorically denied that the incident was terrorist-related.
A bomb has gone off in the centre of Damascus, Syria, Thursday morning 3 December, killing several people. The number of dead has not yet been confirmed by Syrian authorities, but the country’s interior minister, Said Mohammad Sammour, told a Lebanese TV station that it appears to have targeted Iranian pilgrims. Initial media reports indicate that 12 people may have died.
A mine blast early Saturday 21 November in China’s northern Heilongjiang province is now known to have killed 104 miners, with another four still trapped in the coal mine where more than 500 people were working when gas levels suddenly rose. Worries over mine safety have been increasing in China, with several accidents in recent months, and authorities in Beijing have said they are improving conditions. But this latest accident, in a state-owned mine, is prompting even state media to raise the issue of safety.
Updated 15:45 Ed. note: the number of deaths is rising and is now reported to be 23. A “powerful bomb” exploded in the centre of Lahore, Pakistan’s business centre Wednesday 27 May, killing 15 people and shearing the fronts off of several buildings in the area. The blast appears to have been set off by a suicide bomber but CNN reports that it was a well-coordinated attack with gunmen involved as well. The target was a police station with some 200 people inside and the building was demolished. Lahore was the target of bombs in March 2009, for which the Taliban claimed responsibility. BBC, CNN
