Peshawar/Islamabad, Aug 10: Four people were injured when an improvised explosive device derailed six coaches of the Peshawar-bound Jafar Express in the Mastung district of Pakistan’s restive Balochistan province on Sunday.
There were, however, no casualties, officials said.
This is the latest in a series of attacks targeting the Jafar Express.
The improvised explosive device (IED) explosion hit the track near Spezand Railway Station, about 25 kms from Quetta, shortly after the train with 350 passengers had departed the city at 9 am, a railways official said.
“A bomb attached to the railway track exploded loudly, derailing six bogies of the train heading from Quetta to Peshawar. Fortunately, there was no loss of life,” Muhammad Kashif, public relations officer of the Pakistan Railways’ Quetta division, told the media.
All injured passengers sustained minor wounds, the official said.
Rescue teams, including railway staff, were dispatched to the site, and a relief train was sent to transport stranded passengers to Quetta.
Security forces and police cordoned off the area, while a bomb disposal squad was deployed to clear the track.
Meanwhile, in a separate statement, Kashif said the services of the Jaffar Express and Bolan Mail were suspended till August 14.
The Bolan Mail will resume its operations on August 16 (Saturday), when it will depart from Karachi “in its proper turn” and will arrive in Quetta the next day, he added.
The Jafar Express, which runs between Quetta and Peshawar, has been repeatedly targeted in recent months.
On August 7, the train narrowly escaped a disaster near Balochistan’s Sibi railway station, where a bomb planted near the track exploded just after the passenger train had passed.
In another incident, on August 4, gunmen fired five bullets at its pilot engine near Kolpur. The separatist Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) claimed responsibility for the latter attack.
In June, a remotely controlled explosive device fitted to rail tracks exploded, causing four bogies of the Jaffar Express to derail in Jacobabad.
On March 11, the Jaffar Express was hijacked while traveling from Quetta to Peshawar in the Bolan area, resulting in the deaths of 21 passengers and four security personnel. The security forces in a targeted operation killed 33 terrorists involved in attacking the train.
It is believed that ethnic Baloch terrorist groups carry out such attacks.
A July 28 derailment of the same train in Sindh province’s Sukkur was initially attributed to an explosion but the Ministry of Railways later said it was due to a technical fault. (PTI)
