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Dozens of attackers armed with guns, rockets and hand grenades stormed a cluster of small private coal mines in southwestern Pakistan yesterday, slaying some miners in their sleep and shooting others after lining them up, killing at least 21 in the restive region, police said.
The attack by around 40 armed men days before Pakistan hosts a summit of the Shanghai Co-operation Organisation grouping is the worst in weeks in the mineral-rich province of Balochistan bordering Afghanistan and Iran.
“The armed terrorists remained for around 1-1/2 hours in the mining area,” regional police official Asif Shafi said. “They fired rockets and hurled grenades at the mines and miners’ quarters.”
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack on the mines of the Junaid Coal Company in the Duki area, which also injured six.
Among the dead were four Afghan nationals; another four were injured.
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