They rise to 44 dead and a hundred injured after the attack on a political party in northern Pakistan

The death toll in the suicide attack perpetrated this Sunday, July 30, during a well-attended meeting of the Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam (JUI-F) religious party in northern Pakistan, has risen to 44 and the number of wounded is estimated at more than 100. The attack took place in the city of Khar, on the border with Afghanistan, around 4:00 p.m. on Sunday, according to an official from the local police station, Aziz Khan, told EFE.

The Khiber Pakhtunjua Police pointed to the Islamic State on Monday as the possible perpetrator of the attack. “We continue to investigate and collect information about the explosion. The initial investigation shows that the Islamic State, a proscribed organization, was involved,” the authorities said in statements collected by the Geo TV network, according to ercoge EP. In addition, they have reported the arrest of three suspects and that the competent agents are collecting more evidence at the scene of the suicide attack.

Among the deceased is the party leader in Jar, Maulana Ziaulá Khan, and the general secretary of the party in Nawagai, Hamidullah Haqqani.. Other party leaders were also present, such as Maulana Jamaludin or Senator Abdur Rashid, as explained by the JUI-F spokesman in Khiber Pakhtunjua, Abdul Yalil Jan.

The leader of the JUI-F calls his followers to cry

The JUI-F is led by the cleric Fazal ur Rehman, one of the most prominent Islamist exponents in the country's politics and a junior partner in the government coalition.. In his first reaction to the attack, the cleric has demanded from the country's prime minister, Shebhaz Sharif, and the acting chief minister of the state, Azam Khan, an immediate investigation into what happened before calling on his supporters to calm down.

Sharif has announced that he has ordered to investigate what happened and identify those responsible. The Border Corps is on alert and one of its top officials, General Nur Wali Jan, has traveled to Bajaur to monitor the situation.. The president of the Pakistan People's Party (PPP), Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, has urged the Government to bring the “responsible and terrorists” to justice and has conveyed his condolences to the families of the deceased.

Jíber-Pajtunjua, one of the most conflictive borders

Pakistan has experienced an increase in armed violence since the Afghan Taliban came to power in Kabul in August 2021, which reignited attacks by its Pakistani ideological brethren, especially in the Afghan border provinces of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan.

The province of Khíber-Pajtunjua, bordering Afghanistan, is one of the most conflictive in the country and is the base of operations for the Tehrik and Taliban (TTP), known as the “Pakistani Taliban”, which have increased their attacks after giving up The ceasefire ended in November 2022.

271 attacks during the first half of the year

The TTP group, which differs from the Afghan Taliban in organizational matters but follows the same rigorous interpretation of Sunni Islam, brings together more than a dozen Islamist militant groups operating in Pakistan, where they have killed some 70,000 people in two decades of violence.

The country witnessed 271 attacks by armed militants in the first half of the year, killing 389 people and injuring 656 others, according to a report released in early July by the Pakistan Institute for Security and Conflict Studies.. A significant increase in the figures compared to the same period in 2022, when Pakistan suffered 151 attacks that caused 293 deaths and 487 injuries.