Gunmen opened fire on passenger vehicles in a tribal area in northwestern Pakistan on Thursday, killing at least 50 people and wounding 29, the chief secretary of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, Nadeem Aslam Chaudhry, said. Among the fatalities in the attack, which occurred in the Kurram tribal district, were a woman and a child, Chaudhry said, adding: “It’s a major tragedy and the death toll is likely to rise.” Earlier, the news agency reported the death toll as 38.
Tensions have existed for decades between armed Shia and Sunni Muslims over a land dispute in the tribal area that borders Afghanistan.
No group claimed responsibility for the incident.
Gunmen open fire at women and children
“There were two convoys of passenger vehicles, one carrying passengers from Peshawar to Parachinar and another from Parachinar to Peshawar, when armed men opened fire on them,” a local resident of Parachinar, Ziarat Hussain told news agency Reuters by telephone, adding that his relatives were travelling from Peshawar in the convoy.
President Asif Ali Zardari, in a statement, strongly condemned the attack on passenger vehicles.
Most of the victims belonged to the Shia community, they said. The vehicles were ambushed in areas dominated by the Taliban, a local journalist said. According to local media, there were over 200 vehicles in the convoy.
