Blast at political rally in Pakistan kills 43, wounds 200

An ambulance at the scene of an explosion in Pakistan
(Image credit: Rescue 1122 Head Quarters via AP)

At least 43 people were killed and 200 wounded on Sunday in a blast at a political rally in northwest Pakistan.

The explosion occurred in the Khyber Pakhtunnkhwa province and was set off by a suicide bomber, provincial police chief Akhtar Hayat Khan told local media. The rally was organized by the Islamist Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl party, and one of its local leaders, Maulana Ziaullah, was killed in the blast.

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Earlier this year, Pakistani Taliban militants attacked a mosque in Peshawar and launched an assault against the police headquarters in Karachi. Asfandyar Mir, a senior expert at the United States Institute of Peace, told the Times that Sunday's bombing "is yet another reminder that militancy remains ascendant in Pakistan and insecurity is likely to rise in the coming months." Groups like ISIS-K and the Pakistani Taliban, Mir added, "are trying to carve out space for themselves in the country, and that creates incentives for each of these groups to try to distinguish themselves" through their attacks.

Catherine Garcia, The Week US

Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.