By Our Staff reporter
Karachi: A suicide attack killed four people including Chinese nationals in Karachi, Pakistan’s port city on Tuesday. It was the latest attack on Chinese nationals in Pakistan which has exposed loopholes in security measures taken for the foreigners in Pakistan.
It was evident from the CCTV footage that the Chinese nationals were the prime target of a suicide attack carried out by a female student of the University of Karachi. The attacker was identified as miss Shari Baloch, a mother of two beautiful kids. She was a student of Master of Philosophy at the same university. According to CCTV footage, she had arrived at the place of attack a few minutes prior to the arrival of a van carrying the Chinese teachers who used to teach ‘Chinese language’ to locals at an institute of the University of Karachi. The attacker can be seen in CCTV footage waiting for the van at the gate of the University. As the van approached, she blew herself up with a big bang followed by black smoke and fire which had engulfed the van completely. All the passengers were reportedly burnt to death following the blast.
The Baloch Liberation Army took the responsibility for the attack and shared detail about the suicide attacker after the suicide attack. This year, it was the first major attack on the Chinese nationals in living and working in Pakistan. Last year in July, an attack on Chinese engineers working on a hydroelectric dam in Kohistan killed 9 engineers.
Chinese Ministry o Foreign Affairs sharply reacted to the attack.
“The blood of the Chinese people should not be shed in vain, and those behind this incident will surely pay the price,” the ministry said in a statement.
It expressed “strong condemnation and indignation” over the attack and demanded Pakistan investigate thoroughly, punish those responsible, ensure the safety of Chinese citizens, and prevent such incidents from happening again.
Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has condemned the incident. China is a close partner to Pakistan and its biggest source of military and economic support. But in recent years terrorist attacks targeting Chinese nationals and their interests in Pakistan have alarmed Beijing.
Bordering Afghanistan and Iran, Balochistan is Pakistan’s largest but least populated province. It is fundamental to the country’s massive multibillion-dollar infrastructure deal with Beijing, the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC).
In 2020, at least five people died when the Pakistan Stock Exchange in Karachi was targeted in an attack claimed by the BLA, which described its actions as “retaliation” against “Chinese exploitative plans in Balochistan,” CNN reported on Tuesday.
In 2018, the BLA claimed another attack in which gunmen tried to storm the Chinese consulate in Karachi, killing four people. It said it would not tolerate any Chinese military expansionist endeavors.
