Daily Times

The death toll of the Friday suicide attack on peaceful worshipers at Kocha Risaldar’s mosque has mounted to 63 as six more critically wounded succumbed to their injuries at local hospitals here on Saturday.

Police and spokesman of the Lady Reading Hospital, Muammad Asim told APP that death toll of the blast has raised to 63 while 37 critically injured were being treated at different wards and ICU of the Lady Reading Hospital where emergency has already been enforced. Asim said that 57 bodies were brought to hospital on Friday afternoon, soon after the powerful suicide explosion that ripped through the jampacked central mosque at Kocha Risaldar near Qissa Khwani bazaar. In a major development, Interior Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed in a video message shared on his twitter handle, disclosed that all the three suspects involved in the suicide blast have been identified by the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa police and the investigation agencies.

He said the police and investigation agencies have reached close to the suspects and hoped that the attackers would be arrested within next two to three days. Meanwhile, the Counter-Terrorism Department Peshawar has registered a case of the blast under anti terrorism laws and expanded circle of investigation. The latest CCTV footage released by Peshawar police showed that a man dressed in a black ‘shalwar-kameez’ first fired shoots at policemen while entering to the mosque and then detonated a suicide vest packed with ball bearings among worshipers inside its main hall. The footage further showed that suicide attacker along with two accomplices arrived through a rickshaw from Kohati Gate side and later rushed toward the mosque where he fired shots at worshipers and later exploded himself.