43 Shiites killed, several injured after gunmen open fire on bus in Karachi

Forty-three people, including women, were killed and several others injured when gunmen riding motorcycles fired indiscriminately at a bus carrying members of the Ismaili Shia community in the Pakistani port city of Karachi on Wednesday.

Around eight gunmen carried out the attack near Safoora Chowk area of Karachi, an eyewitness told Dawn.com. The gunmen escaped after the attack.

Provincial police chief Ghulam Haider Jamali said 60 people were in the bus when the gunmen opened fire and killed 43 passengers.

Jamali said the bus was on its way to a place of worship for Ismaili Shias when the gunmen boarded it and sprayed the passengers with bullets.

The bus belonged to Al-Azhar Garden Colony, an Ismaili community housing project.

“The bus had a capacity of 52 passengers but it was overloaded and dozens of people were boarding it. Most of them were from (the) Ismaili community,” a policeman at the scene said.

A senior police official told Dawn.com the attackers entered the bus and shot passengers in the head.

Over 60 empty shells were found at the scene.

Several people succumbed to their injuries while being taken to hospital, Pakistani media reports said. The condition of several of the wounded was described as critical.

Fear and panic gripped the area after the attack. Police and paramilitary Pakistan Rangers personnel cordoned off the site of the attack.

No group claimed responsibility for the attack.

Pakistan’s Shia minority has been repeatedly targeted by extremists over the past few years. Scores have died in these attacks.

The Taliban and other Sunni extremist groups, which view Shias as apostates, have long had a presence in Karachi.