Eight Killed in Pakistan Laundry Attack
Gunmen on motorcycles on Saturday shot dead eight men at a laundry in the restive southwestern Pakistani city of Quetta, police said.
The gunmen were riding two motorcycles when they struck at the laundry in a busy area of Quetta, the capital of Baluchistan province, before fleeing, they said.
"At least eight men were killed and another man was wounded," senior police official Iskandar Tareen told Agence France Presse.
Initial investigations indicated that the victims were "settlers," he said, referring to people who have settled in Baluchistan but come from other provinces of Pakistan.
There was no claim of responsibility for the attack, but Baluchistan suffers from Islamist militancy, sectarian violence between Sunni and Shiite Muslims and a separatist insurgency which also targets non-natives.
Baluch rebels rose up in the province in 2004, demanding political autonomy and a greater share of profits from oil, gas and mineral resources in the region.
It is one of the most deprived regions of Pakistan despite its wealth in resources, and human rights activists have accused the military of mass arrests and extra-judicial executions in its bid to put down the separatist insurgency.
Source: Agence France Presse
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