More than 30 dead in new violence in Pakistan

PESHAWAR, Pakistan — At least 32 people were killed and 47 injured in sectarian clashes in northwestern Pakistan, an official told Agence France-Presse (AFP) on Saturday, two days after 43 people were killed in attacks on Shiite passenger convoys.

Nearly 150 people have been killed in the past few months in sporadic clashes between Sunni and Shiite Muslims in the mountainous Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province bordering Afghanistan.

“Clashes between Shiite and Sunni communities continue in many places. According to the latest reports, 32 people were killed, including 14 Sunnis and 18 Shiites,” a senior administration official told AFP. Anonymity on Saturday.

Anger Against the Attack Pakistani Shia Muslims chanted slogans while protesting the attack on passenger vehicles in the Kurram district of Peshawar city in Pakistan’s northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province on November 22, 2024, which killed 40 people. EPA PHOTO

On Thursday, gunmen opened fire on two separate convoys of Shiite Muslims traveling under police escort in the province’s Kurram district, killing 43 people, while the condition of 11 injured was still “critical”, officials told AFP.

In retaliation, Shiite Muslims on Friday evening attacked several Sunni places in Kurram, a once semi-autonomous region where sectarian violence has resulted in hundreds of deaths over the years.

“At around 19:00 in the evening, a group of angry Shiites attacked the Sunni-dominated Bagan Bazaar,” a senior police officer working in Kurram told AFP.

“After firing, they set fire to the entire market and entered nearby houses, poured gasoline and set them on fire. Initial reports indicate that more than 300 shops and more than 100 houses were burned,” he said.

He added that local Sunnis also “hit back at the attackers.”

Javedullah Mehsud, a senior official in Kurram, said there were efforts to restore peace “through the deployment of security forces” and with the help of “local dignitaries”.

Thousands of Shiite Muslims took to the streets in various cities of Pakistan on Friday, following the attacks on Thursday that resulted in the death of 43 people, including seven women and three children.

Hundreds of people demonstrated in Lahore, Pakistan’s second largest city, and Karachi, the commercial center.

Thousands of people participated in the sit-in protest in Parachinar, the main city of Kurram, while hundreds of people, especially Shiite civilians, attended the funerals of the victims.

Tribal and family feuds are common in Sunni-majority Pakistan, where the Shiite community has long suffered discrimination and violence.

The latest violence has drawn condemnation from authorities and human rights groups.

The Independent Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) this month called on authorities to pay “urgent attention” to the “alarming frequency of clashes” in the region, warning that the situation had reached “humanitarian crisis proportions”.

“The fact that local rival groups clearly have access to heavy weapons shows that the state is unable to control the flow of weapons into the region,” the HRCP said in a statement. he said.

At least 16 people, including 3 women and 2 children, lost their lives in the sectarian conflict in the district last month.

Earlier clashes in July and September killed dozens of people and ended only after a jirga, or tribal council, called for a ceasefire. The HRCP said 79 people died in sectarian clashes between July and October.

These clashes and attacks come just days after at least 20 soldiers were killed in separate incidents in the province.