Car bombing targeting Shiites in Pakistan kills 19

A car bomb targeting a bus carrying Shiite Muslim pilgrims killed 19 people in southwest Pakistan, officials and eyewitnesses said.
     
Earlier Sunday, 21 tribal policemen believed to have been kidnapped by the Taliban were found shot dead in Pakistan's troubled northwest tribal region, government officials said.
     
Reports conflicted about whether the car bombing was a suicide attack or the device was detonated remotely.
     
Pakistan has experienced a spike in killings over the last year by radical Sunni Muslims targeting Shiites, whom they consider heretics. The violence has been especially pronounced in Baluchistan province, where the latest attack occurred.
   
In addition to the 19 people killed in the bombing in Baluchistan's Mastung district, 25 others were wounded, many of them critically, said Tufail Ahmed, a local political official. The blast destroyed the bus and damaged a nearby bus also carrying Shiites.
 
In a separate story, the bodies of nine fighters from the Taliban with gunshot wounds were found dumped in the tribal region of northwestern Pakistan near the Afghan border, on the side of a road in the village of Bir Cali North Waziristan.


AP/LBCI