Pakistan is paying compensation totalling more than $700,000 to the families of 40 people killed in a suicide bombing at a Shiite mosque in Islamabad this month, the prime minister’s office said on Thursday.
The February 6 attack claimed by the Islamic State (IS) group on the outskirts of the capital was the deadliest in Islamabad since a 2008 truck bombing that killed 60 people at the Marriott Hotel.
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“Relief cheques have been delivered to the heirs of 36 martyrs belonging to Islamabad,” Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s office said in a statement, adding each victim’s family received five million rupees (around $17,800).
Cheques will also be delivered to four families of victims living outside Islamabad, the statement said.
Although officials have not released a final death toll, the statement marked the first official acknowledgement that 40 people were killed in the blast.
The suicide attack occurred during Friday prayers, when mosques around the country are packed with worshippers.
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Pakistan is a Sunni-majority nation, but Shiites make up between 10 and 15 percent of the population and have been targeted in attacks throughout the region in the past.
The last major attack in Islamabad took place in November when a suicide blast outside a court killed 12 people and wounded dozens, the first such incident to hit the capital in nearly three years.
The bombings come as Pakistan’s security forces battle intensifying insurgencies in southern and northern provinces that border Afghanistan.
Last year, militant assaults killed 1,235 people — including 825 security personnel and 400 civilians — with 27 suicide attacks reported nationwide and 2,597 militants killed.
