ISLAMABAD: A roadside bomb explosion has killed an army officer and injured two soldiers in Pakistan’s southwestern province of Balochistan on Sunday, the military’s media wing said.
The ISPR identified the officer as Captain Kashif, who lost his life after the vehicle he was traveling in “struck an IED [Improvised Explosive Device] planted by terrorists in Tobo, Gichik Balochistan.”
Pakistan’s Interior Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed condemned the attack, saying in a statement on Sunday: “Terrorists cannot deter our courage with such cowardly attacks. We are fighting the terrorists with full force and will defeat them.”
The attack follows a suicide bombing on Friday targeting a vehicle carrying Chinese nationals in Balochistan, killing two children and injuring three.
In June, six soldiers were killed in an IED attack in the Mach district of Balochistan while on patrol duty.
Balochistan is at the center of the prestigious and strategic multi-billion dollar China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) project.
CPEC has seen Beijing pledge over $60 billion for infrastructure projects in Pakistan, central to China’s wider Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) to develop land and sea trade routes in Asia and beyond.