Pakistan Taliban (TTP) has claimed the suicide blast at one of Pakistan’s most visited Sufi shrines where 10 people were killed and 24 were wounded. Pakistan Taliban (TTP) is a notorious terror organization who seek to implement a strict implementation of Sharia Law in Pakistan.
Data Darbar Attack: 8 Killed in Suicide Bomb Blast in Data Darbar Shrine, Lahore
The blast — which a faction of the terrorist group – Pakistan Taliban claimed by email — happened near the entrance gate for female visitors to the Data Darbar shrine, one of the largest Sufi shrines in South Asia during the holy month of Ramadan.
Husks of vehicles littered the pavement near the shrine as first responders rushed to the scene while armed security forces fanned out in the area. The shrine has long been home to colourful Sufi festivals and a prime destination for the country’s myriad Muslim sects, making it a soft target for terrorist attacks.
Pakistani vendors in Karachi sell traditional Muslim skullcaps and food for the holy month of Ramadan, which is calculated on the sighting of the new moon, and during which Muslims fast from dawn until dusk.
It has been targeted previously, in a 2010 suicide attack which killed more than 40 people. Since then the area has been increasingly hemmed in by heavy security, with visitors forced to pass through several layers of screening before they can enter the complex.
Sufi worshippers, who follow a mystical strain of Islam, have frequently been the target of bloody attacks in Pakistan by Islamist terrorists — including the Islamic State group — who consider Sufi beliefs and rituals at the graves of Muslim saints as heresy.
Senior police official Muhammad Ashfaq told a press conference that the security personnel at the shrine were targeted. Three police officials, two security guards and five civilians including a child were among the dead, Punjab province chief minister Usman Buzdar said.
Pakistan’s push against extremism was stepped up after the country’s deadliest ever attack, an assault on a school in Peshawar in 2014 that left more than 150 people dead — mostly children.
Since then, security has dramatically improved but terrorists retain the ability to carry out dramatic attacks.
Major urban centres such as Lahore, Pakistan’s second largest city and the provincial capital of its wealthiest province, Punjab, are not immune.
An attack in the city in March last year left nine people dead, while a major blast targeting Christians celebrating Easter in a park in 2016 killed more than 70 people.
Critics have long argued the military and government crackdown has not addressed the root causes of extremism in Pakistan, where hardline Muslim groups often target religious minorities.
The Data Darbar complex contains the shrine of Saint Syed Ali bin Osman Al-Hajvery, popularly known as Data Ganj Bakhsh. Originally from Afghanistan, he was one of the most popular Sufi preachers on the subcontinent.
