Four wounded in roadside blast in northwest Pakistan

At least four people, including a child, have been injured in a roadside bomb explosion in Pakistan’s northwestern city of Peshawar.

Police officials said the blast happened on Sunday morning when an improvised explosive device (IED) was detonated, hitting a vehicle in the Phandu Road area of the city.

Qari Salahuddin, an Afghan national who taught at a local seminary, his driver, a passenger and a passerby child were wounded in the incident.

Rescue teams and law enforcement agencies rushed to the scene and took the injured to nearby hospitals. According to rescue officials, the number of casualties could rise.

The site of the explosion was cordoned off by security forces, and an investigation has been launched into the blast.

Although no group or individual has claimed responsibility for the bombings so far, such attacks are usually carried out by pro-Taliban militants operating in the country.

Pakistan has been engaged in a major offensive against militant hideouts across the troubled northwestern tribal regions since June 2014, when a deadly raid on the Karachi International Airport ended the government’s faltering peace talks with the pro-Taliban militants.

Pakistan’s army intensified its military operations after the militants killed over 150 people, most of them children, in an armed assault on a school in Peshawar in December 2014. Pakistani officials say over 3,400 militants have been killed since the launch of the operation.