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Death Toll Rises In Pakistan Market Blast


Pakistani security officials inspect the site of a bomb explosion at a vegetable market in Parachinar city, the capital of the Kurram tribal district.
Pakistani security officials inspect the site of a bomb explosion at a vegetable market in Parachinar city, the capital of the Kurram tribal district.

Officials in Pakistan have raised the death toll from a January 21 market bombing in Parchinar to 24, as three of the injured died during the night.

Naseerullah Khan, a regional official in the Kurram tribal district in Pakistan's mainly Shi'ite northwestern tribal belt, told journalists that 90 people had been wounded. Twenty-five of the injured have been transferred to a military hospital in Peshawar.

The blast was caused by an improvised explosive device hidden in a box of vegetables. The Hakimullah Mehsud faction of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) extremist group claimed responsibility for the attack.

The attack was carried out "to teach a lesson to Shi'ites for their support for [Syrian President] Bashar al-Assad," a spokesman for the group was quoted as telling the AFP news agency.

Based on reporting by AFP, AP, and Reuters

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