Pakistan bombings kill at least 49 in 3 different regions

The World

A series of bombings left at least 49 people dead in three different regions of Pakistan on Sunday, including a roadside bomb that scored a direct hit on a bustling market in the northwest city of Peshwar.

At least 17 people were killed and dozens wounded in that blast.

"The blast was so powerful that it destroyed 10 shops and eight vehicles," said Mir Ajab Khan, the head of a police station in Badhber, the Peshawar neighborhood where the attack took place, according to Reuters.  "Many of the wounded were women and children."

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Four children were killed, and all of the dead were civilians except for a single policeman. The bomb appears to have been placed inside of a car that was then parked at the side of the road, according to the BBC.

The deadliest of the attacks was a twin blast near a Shiite mosque in Quetta that left at least 28 dead and wounded a number of women and children, according to the Associated Press.

A hand grenade caused the initial explosion, causing people to run in the direction of the mosque, where a suicide bomber detonated his explosives, police told the AP.

Elsewhere in the northwest, a roadside bomb struck an army convoy and killed four soldiers in the North Waziristan tribal area, the Taliban's main sanctuary in Pakistan. Twenty solders were also injured, according to the AP.

In the earlier car blast, Frontier Corps police officers and the militants exchanged fire after the bombing, and two of those soldiers appear to have been injured in the fighting, wrote the Associated Press. 

"This is a very sad incident. There have been targeted operations in that area in the last few days and we have arrested many terrorists from that area," said local administration official Javed Khan of the blast to AP. 

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