Dozen dead in car blast in Pakistani capital

A suicide bomb attack in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, has left at least a dozen people dead and 27 injured, Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi said on Tuesday. The incident occurred outside a court building in the G-11 sector of the city.

Naqvi said the attacker had planned to enter the court building, but blew himself up near a police van outside the complex after being unable to gain access.

Security forces have since cordoned off the area and an investigation has been launched to determine those involved in the attack.

The Pakistani Taliban (TTP), a jihadist terrorist organization operating primarily along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, later claimed responsibility for the suicide bombing, stating it was targeting “judges, lawyers and officials who carried out rulings under Pakistan’s un-Islamic laws,” as per the Alarabiya news outlet. The TTP vowed more attacks until Islamic law is fully implemented in the country.

Pakistani Defense Minister Khawaja Asif had linked the blast to Afghanistan. In a post on X, he stated that the “suicide attack” on the Islamabad District Court is a “wake-up call” that the conflict in the Afghan-Pakistan border region of Bаlochistan is “a war for all of Pakistan.”

“The rulers of Kabul can stop terrorism in Pakistan, but bringing this war all the way to Islamabad is a message from Kabul, to which – praise be to God – Pakistan has the full strength to respond,” he said.