Pakistan mosque bomber was disguised as a policeman, official says | Information
Islamabad, Pakistan
Information
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The suicide bomber who targeted a mosque inside a police compound in Peshawar, killing far more than 80 people today, was a member of the Pakistani Taliban disguised as a policeman, a senior official said Thursday.
CCTV footage exhibits the suspected bomber arriving at a police checkpoint on a scooter Monday, asking a constable the way to the mosque, and currently being allow by means of due to the fact he was in uniform, explained Moazzam Jah Ansari, police chief of Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.
“This was a suicide bomber and we have traced his motion. He was in a law enforcement uniform,” Ansari reported.
“We are closing in on the network. Each everyday living of our martyrs will be avenged,” he added.
Officials had previously place the death toll at extra than 100, but some of the bodies have been counted two times, Ansari explained. The blast also hurt 217.
The advancement comes just one working day following police in Peshawar arrested a number of suspects.
Law enforcement believe 12 kilograms (26.5 lbs .) of explosives had been utilised by the bomber.
Video clip footage confirmed the ruined partitions of the mosque, its glass windows and paneling destroyed by the potent explosion.
Unexpected emergency workers searched for survivors, but authorities reported most of those located less than the rubble were by now dead.
The blast Monday highlights the deteriorating safety situation in Peshawar, money of the restive Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province that borders Afghanistan, and the website of recurrent assaults by the Pakistani Taliban, known as Tehreek-e-Taliban (TTP).
The TTP has sent out conflicting messages about irrespective of whether it was powering the attack.
TTP officials Sarbakaf Mohmand and Omar Mukaram Khurasani earlier said the blast was “revenge” for the dying of TTP militant Khalid Khorasani very last calendar year.
But the TTP’s key spokesperson, Muhammad Khorasani, afterwards denied the group was concerned.
The assault comes during a rocky time period for Pakistan, which is also having difficulties with a value of residing disaster and a faltering economic climate created even worse by devastating floods previous year.