Taliban claim Quetta attack,toll up to 65

Local journalist Ali Raza,who was injured when two suicide bombers targeted a procession in Lahore on Wednesday,succumbed to injuries on Saturday.

“Our war is against America and Pakistan,” Hussain said. “Attacks on the pattern of the botched car bombing in New York’s Time Square will be carried out in Europe and the US soon… More attacks… will prove that the Taliban are still organised and active,” he said.

Hussain said the US’s decision to place the Taliban on a terrorist blacklist showed that America is scared of them.

Sixty people were killed when a suicide bomber blew himself up at a rally organised by Shia students in Quetta on Friday. Nearly 40 died when two suicide attackers targeted a Shia procession in Lahore on Wednesday.

The toll from Friday’s blast climbed up as a number of critically wounded people died in hospitals,police said and condition of more than 150 was serious.

Quetta mourned its dead by observing a complete shutdown in response to a call by Shia leaders.

Pro-Taliban Pakistani militants are trying to create a sectarian rift,Interior Minister Rehman Malik said on Saturday. Malik said al-Qaeda-linked militants were trying to whip up sectarianism after taking a beating in their strongholds in the country’s northwest.

Malik said the Tehrik-e-Taliban,al-Qaeda and the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ),one of the most violent anti-Shi’ite groups with roots in the Punjab province,were all part of the same organisation.

“Lashkar-e-Jhangvi,al-Qaeda,TTP,they are one,” he said. “They are infidels,” he told reporters in Islamabad.