At least 22 people were killed and 40 others injured in a suicide bomb attack on a procession of minority Shias in Pakistan’s Sindh province on Friday. The attack comes a day after 12 others were killed in another suicide attack at a Shia shrine in Balochistan on the eve of Muharram.
The bomber targeted a Shiite procession being taken out as part of Muharram festival in Jacobabad. District police Chief Shah Zaman Khuro confirmed the attack.
Police said that the death toll may rise as some of the injured were in critical condition.
The minority Shias are regularly attacked by extremist Sunni militant groups in Pakistan who consider them heretics.
The government has taken extraordinary security measures for the two most important days of the month of Muharram with thousands of paramilitary rangers and police deployed in major cities and towns to avoid any terrorist attacks which could trigger off sectarian violence.
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