70 dead in Pakistan hospital bombing

A suicide bomber has killed at least 70 people as they gathered to mourn a murdered journalist in Pakistan. The devastating attack took place at a hospital in Quettain, in the violence-plagued southwestern province of Baluchistan. The bomber struck as more than 100 grievers, mostly lawyers and journalists, crowded into the emergency department to accompany the body of a prominent lawyer, who had been shot and killed in the city earlier in the day.
"There are many wounded, so the death toll could rise," said Rehmat Saleh Baloch, the provincial health minister.
The explosion at a hospital in Quetta on Monday also injured 112 others, said Rehmat. The explosion at 9:30 a.m. local time (12.30 a.m. ET) rocked the emergency ward of the civil hospital, Sarfaraz Bugti, Home Minister of Balochistan.

"It was a scene of utter horror and devastation in the courtyard hospital," Wall Street Journal reporter Saeed Shah told CNN's Max Foster from Islamabad. "There were bodies strewn everywhere, bleeding lawyers trying to get up."
Jamat-ul-Ahrar, a splinter group of Pakistan's Tehreek-i Taliban (TTP) -- also known as the Pakistan Taliban -- has claimed responsibility for both the hospital blast and Kasi's death, according to Ihsanullah Ihsan, a spokesman for the faction. Kasi was the president of the Balochistan Bar Association.
Pakistan's Prime Minister Muhammad Nawaz Sharif condemned the blast, saying, "No one will be allowed to disturb peace in the province that has been restored due to countless sacrifices of security forces, police and the people of Balochistan."

The prime minister said in a statement that he has directed authorities to "maintain utmost vigilance" and that the country has boosted security for members in the legal fraternity as well as for the rest of society.