MOSABJA
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QUETTA, Pakistan: A military pickup struck a land mine in Pakistan's insurgency-hit Baluchistan province Sunday, killing four troops and wounding two others, police said. A rebel group claimed responsibility for the attack.
The explosion occurred along a dirt road near the tribal town of Dera Bugti, where the troops were on a routine security patrol guarding a gas well, said local police chief Najmuddin Tareen.
The pickup carrying seven troops hit a land mine, triggering an explosion that killed four of them at the scene. Two others were wounded, one of them seriously, Tareen said.
Authorities say armed rebel tribesmen operating in the area target security forces with rockets and land mines. Troops are deployed in the rugged tribal area to guard key gas wells and pipelines.
Rebel tribesmen resent the troops' presence in their territory and have been blamed for attacking gas installations in a campaign to press demands for an increase in gas royalties.
A purported spokesman for a little-known insurgent group, the Baluch Republican Army, claimed responsibility for the attack near Dera Bugti, saying it was a remote-controlled bomb that targeted the troops. He claimed 12 troops were killed.
"We did this because they have occupied our homeland. Our struggle against the occupiers will continue," said the spokesman, Sarbaz Baluch, in a telephone call to journalists in Quetta.
The explosion occurred along a dirt road near the tribal town of Dera Bugti, where the troops were on a routine security patrol guarding a gas well, said local police chief Najmuddin Tareen.
The pickup carrying seven troops hit a land mine, triggering an explosion that killed four of them at the scene. Two others were wounded, one of them seriously, Tareen said.
Authorities say armed rebel tribesmen operating in the area target security forces with rockets and land mines. Troops are deployed in the rugged tribal area to guard key gas wells and pipelines.
Rebel tribesmen resent the troops' presence in their territory and have been blamed for attacking gas installations in a campaign to press demands for an increase in gas royalties.
A purported spokesman for a little-known insurgent group, the Baluch Republican Army, claimed responsibility for the attack near Dera Bugti, saying it was a remote-controlled bomb that targeted the troops. He claimed 12 troops were killed.
"We did this because they have occupied our homeland. Our struggle against the occupiers will continue," said the spokesman, Sarbaz Baluch, in a telephone call to journalists in Quetta.
