Islamabad, November 02: A Suicide bomber on a motorbike ripped through workers queuing for their salaries near a Pakistan hotel today, killing 20 people as the UN pulled expatriate staff from the northwest of the country.
The force of the explosion outside a bank near the four-star Shalimar Hotel in the garrison city of Rawalpindi showered the area with body parts.
“We were sitting on the second floor of our office. It was a huge blast,” Raja Sher Ali, a marketing manager in a local company, said.
“Our building shook as if in an earthquake and when we came out there was smoke everywhere and body parts were thrown into our office,” she said.
A surge in militant attacks left more than 300 people dead last month as the military presses a major offensive against the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) movement in the tribal belt, infested with Al-0aeda-linked operatives.
A senior police official said the suicide bomber drove a motorbike towards the queue of people waiting for their salaries at a bank when he blew up.
“The suicide bomber came on a motorcycle and blew up close to people gathered to get salaries. We found parts of a suicide vest and some body parts of the suicide attacker,” senior police official Aslam Tarin said.
“At least 20 people were killed and more than 20 were wounded,” he added.
—-Agencies