Quetta, Pakistan: At least 60 people were killed and 118 injured when militants attacked a police training academy in Quetta, Pakistan, late Monday night, government officials said. Major General Sher Afgan, Chief of the Paramilitary Frontier Corps, told reporters Tuesday that Pakistan-based group Lashkar-e-jhangvi was behind the attack — an al Qaeda-linked militant group that has repeatedly carried out deadly attacks on the country’s Shiite Muslim minority in recent years. One attacker was killed by security forces; two others died when they detonated bombs they were carrying.
Quetta is the capital of Balochistan, a province long-plagued by violence. In August of this year, the city saw one of the deadliest attacks Pakistan has ever seen when prominent lawyer, and president of the Balochistan Bar Association, Bilal Kasi, was murdered by gunmen. Hours later, more than 72 people were killed in a bombing at a hospital where his body was taken.