Mastung tragedy victims laid to rest

QUETTA: The victims of the Mastung suicide attack were laid to rest in two graveyards of the city on Friday.

22 victims belonging to the Hazara community were laid to rest at the Bahisht-e-Zainab graveyard while four were buried at the Hazara Town graveyard.

Grief-stricken mourners of the Hazara community had refused to bury their dead after a roadside blast on Tuesday hit a bus around 60 kilometres (40 miles) west of Quetta, the capital of Balochistan province. Over a two-day protest, up to 2,000 people, most of them Hazara’s, demonstrated in freezing temperatures on Quetta´s busy Alamdar Road with the bodies of the bombing victims, refusing to bury them until action was taken against militants.

There were also demonstrations in Karachi, Lahore, Multan and Rawalpindi.

A delegation of federal ministers was flown to Quetta on Thursday to persuade the angry demonstrators to end the protest. The delegation, lead by the interior minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, held meetings with representatives of the Hazara community and leaders of Shia religious parties.

Abdul Khaliq Hazara, chairman of Hazara Democratic Party, said after negotiations that demonstrators had agreed to end their protest. "We thank all the people who held protest demonstrations across the country to express their solidarity with us and we appeal to them to end their protests peacefully," he added.

Nisar said a targeted operation would be conducted against those behind the bombing."We will bring the terrorists to book," he told the grief-stricken gathering, saying all efforts would be made to restore the order in the province. "I stand by the Hazara community in this hour of grief and trial," he said.

The militant outfit Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ) has claimed responsibility for Tuesday´s attack.