Pakistan points finger at 'foreign hand' in Quetta blast

Pakistan on Thursday blamed 'foreign elements' for the recent Quetta suicide bombing that killed 74 people, mostly lawyers, in the restive Balochistan province.

Claiming that India was fomenting instability in Pakistan, Foreign Office (FO) spokesman Nafees Zakaria said, "Indian intelligence agencies have remained involved in subversive activities in Pakistan especially in Balochistan and Karachi." Zakaria said that Pakistan's stand on Indian hand in militancy had been "vindicated" by the confessional statement of Indian naval officer Kulbhushan Jadav, arrested earlier this year in Balochistan for allegedly running a network to carry out terrorism.

Zakaria also rejected the Indian allegations that Pakistan military aided infiltration attempts by militants along the LoC. "We have a firm position on it and we will not allow our land to be used against any other country," he said.

He further said that Pakistan has made no distinction between terrorist groups and was targeting them through a sustained military effort. The spokesperson also expressed concern on the "continuous human rights violations in Kashmir" and asked the international community to raise voice against it.

"We have condemned the Indian atrocities in Kashmir at the highest level and also asked the UN Human Rights Commission to send a fact finding mission to Kashmir," he said. A suicide bombing at a Quetta hospital on Monday had killed at least 74 people, many of them senior lawyers, targetting the legal community in the troubled southwestern region.