Pak Taliban claims responsibility for Lower Dir bomb blast

ISLAMABAD - The Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has claimed responsibility for Wednesday’s bomb blast in which three US soldiers along with nine others, including four girl students were killed in Lower Dir.

“We claim responsibility for the blast. We have warned we will take revenge and today we have avenged the deaths of innocent people,” a self-proclaimed spokesperson of the TTP, Azam Tariq said.

Tariq also claimed that the killed soldiers belonged to the controversial US private security firm, Blackwater.

At least 115 people, including 95 schoolgirls, were injured in the attack, and have been admitted to a local hospital in Timergara.

The US soldiers were travelling in a convoy with local troops, journalists and officials and were on their way for an inauguration ceremony of a girl’s school in the region.

While the Inter Services Public Relations (ISPR) said that an improvised explosive device (IED) was used to trigger the deadly blast, some officials said it was a roadside bomb, which was detonated by remote control.

Other conflicting reports said it was a suicide attack, The Daily Times reported.

Security sources in Peshawar said they were investigating if the TTP was tipped off about the presence of US soldiers in the convoy.

Meanwhile, a spokesman for the US embassy in Islamabad while condemning the attack said the carnage “shows the vision of the terrorists.”

US Special Envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke also condemned the attack, saying the US soldiers appeared not to have been “directly targeted”, and denied Taliban charges the they worked for Blackwater.(ANI)