QUETTA: Unidentified assailants threw a hand grenade at a security vehicle as it passed through a town in Sorab town of Balochistan on Tuesday, wounding at least 14 passers-by, police and officials said.
No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack on a vehicle belonging to the paramilitary Frontier Corps, said Mohammad Aslam, a local police official.
Sorab is 150 kilometers (90 miles) south of Quetta.
Such attacks on security forces and government officials in Balochistan have intensified in recent times, with previous assaults claimed mostly by Afghanistan-based Indian-backed militant groups.
The latest attack came days after militants attacked another Frontier Corps checkpoint in the province, martyring seven troops before fleeing the scene.
According to an Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) statement, the post located in the Shahrag town of Harnai came under “terrorist fire raid” late at night.
In October, a gun and rocket attack targeting a paramilitary escort in the town of Ormara martyred seven soldiers and seven private security guards.
The attack comes weeks after the military began the fencing of the Gwadar port to protect the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) projects and change the security dynamics in the restive city.
The Balochistan government has planned to fence off 24 square kilometers of the city, which is at the center of the over $64 billion game-changer project that aims to connect China’s strategic Xinxiang province to Gwadar through a network of roads, railways and pipelines to transport cargo, oil, and gas.
Reports suggest there will be two entry points to the fenced part of the city and more than 500 surveillance cameras will be installed.
