1 killed, 12 injured in blast at Pakistan's Saddar area

• Image Credit: Internet

• May 13, 2022 | Dhupali Das

Notably, in the past few months, Pakistan has seen increased militant attacks.

Digital Desk: A bomb blast in Karachi killed one person and injured 12 others late Thursday, police said, just two weeks after a suicide attack by a Pakistani separatist group killed four people in the same city.

At around 11 pm  (1800 GMT), an explosion swept through the Saddar area, one of Pakistan's most populated cities. 

"The initial investigation showed that the explosive material was hidden on a motorcycle parked near a garbage bin. The attack's target was not immediately revealed," said local police station officer Sajjad Khan.

Khan added that a coast guard vehicle was among many vehicles damaged in the explosion and that the one person killed was a passerby.

In an attack on a minibus carrying employees from a Beijing cultural programme at Karachi University last month, a female suicide bomber killed four individuals, three of whom were Chinese nationals.

Later the incident was claimed by the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA), a group fighting for independence in Pakistan's biggest and poorest province.

Under a $54 billion programme known as the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, China has undertaken substantial energy and infrastructure investments in Balochistan.

However, the scheme has drawn the ire of Baloch separatists, who claim that locals are not receiving their due part of the region's natural resources.

A suicide bomb attack at a luxury hotel in Quetta, the provincial capital of Balochistan, in April 2021 killed four people and injured dozens more.

Moreover, in January, Baloch separatists bombed the eastern megacity of Lahore, killing three and injuring 22.

 Notably, in the past few months, Pakistan has seen increased militant attacks.

According to the Pakistan Institute for Conflict and Security Studies, assaults increased by 24% between March and April.