The World Pakistan suicide bombing death toll rises to 54 as families hold funerals, police say

By Anwarullah Khan & Riaz Khan

The Associated Press

KHAR, Pakistan—The death toll from a massive suicide bombing that targeted an election rally for a pro-Taliban cleric rose to 54 on Monday, as Pakistan held funerals and the government vowed to hunt down those behind the attack.

No one immediately claimed responsibility for Sunday’s bombing, which also wounded nearly 200 people. Police said their initial investigation suggested that the Islamic State group’s regional affiliate could be responsible.

The victims were attending a rally organized by the Jamiat Ulema Islam party, headed by hard-line cleric and politician Fazlur Rehman. He did not attend the rally, held under a large tent close to a market in Bajur, a district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province that borders Afghanistan.

Rehman, who has long supported Afghanistan’s Taliban government, escaped at least two known bomb attacks in 2011 and 2014, when bombings damaged his car at rallies.

Victims of the bombing were buried in Bajur on Monday.

As condolences continued to pour in from across the country, dozens of people who received minor injuries were discharged from hospital while the critically wounded were taken to the provincial capital of Peshawar by army helicopters. The death toll continued to rise as critically wounded people died in hospital, physician Gul Naseeb said.

On Monday, police recorded statements from some of the wounded at a hospital in Khar, Bajur’s largest town. Feroz Jamal, the provincial information minister, said police were “investigating this attack in all aspects.”

At least 1,000 people were gathered under a large tent Sunday as their party prepared for parliamentary elections, expected in October or November.

“People were chanting God is Great on the arrival of senior leaders, when I heard the deafening sound of the bomb,” said Khan Mohammad, a local resident who said he was standing outside the tent.

Mohammad said he heard people crying for help, and minutes later ambulances started arriving and taking the wounded away.

Abdul Rasheed, a senior leader in Rehman’s party said the bombing was aimed at weakening the party but that “such attacks cannot deter our resolve.”

Islamist groups have long had a presence in Bajur. The district was formerly a base for Al-Qaeda and a stronghold of the outlawed Pakistani Taliban, known as Tehreeke-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP. The army declared the district clear of the group in 2016 following a series of offensives.

The IS regional affiliate, known as the Islamic State in Khorasan Province, is based in neighboring Afghanistan’s Nangarhar province and is a rival of the Afghan Taliban and Al-Qaeda.

Shaukat Abbas, a senior police officer, said that police have made progress in their investigation, but did not provide details.

Pakistani security analyst Mahmood Shah told The Associated Press that breakaway factions of the TTP could also be behind the attack. He said some TTP members have been known to disobey their top leadership to carry out attacks, as have breakaway factions of the group.

Shah said such factions could have perpetrated the attack to cause “confusion, instability and unrest ahead of the elections.”

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif is expected to dissolve Pakistan’s parliament in August.

Rehman’s party is part of Sharif’s coalition government, which came to power in April 2022 by ousting former Prime Minister Imran Khan through a no-confidence vote in the legislature.

Sharif called Rehman to express

Ukraine: Russian missiles hit another apartment building and likely trapped people under rubble

By Felipe Dana

The Associated Press

KYIV, Ukraine—Russian missiles slammed into the central Ukrainian city of Kryvyi Rih, killing two people, wounding at least 20 others and trapping up to seven beneath rubble, Ukraine’s interior minister said Monday.

The two missiles struck an apartment building, destroying a section of it between the fourth and ninth floors, Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko said. Part of a fourstory university building also was destroyed, he said.

Meanwhile, a Ukrainian artillery strike on partially occupied Donetsk province killed two people and wounded six in the regional capital, according to Denis Pushilin, the Moscowinstalled leader of the llegally annexed province.

A bus was also hit as Ukrainian forces shelled the city of Donetsk multiple times Monday, Pushilin said.

Neither side’s claims could be independently verified.

In Kryvyi Rih, video showed rescue crews working through the wreckage from the part of the university building that was demolished.

Black smoke billowed from corner apartments in the apartment building. Outside, debris was strewn across the tree-lined street. Parked cars were burned out or damaged.

The governor of Dnipropetrovsk province, Serhii Lysak, said the morning attack wounded 31 people, including four children. It was not possible to reconcile different casualty figures.

Kryvyi Rih is the hometown of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. The Kremlin’s forces have occasionally targeted the city since they invaded Ukraine in February 2022.

Bombarding populated areas with missiles, artillery and drones has been a hallmark of Moscow’s tactics during the war, with some aerial attacks hitting civilian areas. The strategy has continued during a Ukrainian counteroffensive that is trying to drive Russian forces out of occupied areas.

Russian officials insist they only take aim at legitimate military targets. Commenting on Monday’s attack, Ukraine’s his condolences and assure the cleric that those who orchestrated the attack would be punished. The bombing has also drawn nationwide condemnation, with ruling and opposition parties offering condolences to the families of the victims. The U.S. and Russian embassies in Islamabad also condemned the attack.

Khan condemned the bombing Sunday.

The Pakistani Taliban also distanced themselves from the attack, saying that the attack aimed to set Islamists against each other. Zabihullah Mujahid, the spokesman for the Afghan Taliban, wrote in a tweet that “such crimes cannot be justified in any way.”

The bombing came hours before the arrival of Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng in Islamabad, where on Monday he was to participate in an event to mark a decade of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, a sprawling package under which Beijing has invested billions of dollars in Pakistan.

In recent months, China has helped Pakistan avoid a default on sovereign payments. Some Chinese nationals have also been targeted by militants in northwestern Pakistan and elsewhere.

Sunday’s bombing was one of the four worst attacks in northwestern Pakistan since 2014, when 147 people, mostly schoolchildren, were killed in a Taliban attack on an army-run school in Peshawar.

In January, 74 people were killed in a bombing at a mosque in Peshawar. And in February, more than 100 people, mostly policemen, died in a bombing at a mosque inside a high-security compound housing Peshawar police headquarters.

The Associated Press writer Munir Ahmed contributed to this story from Islamabad.

Dispute over Persian Gulf gas field poses challenge to SaudiIranian rapprochement

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates—An escalating dispute over a gas field in the Persian Gulf poses an early challenge to a Chinese-brokered agreement to reconcile regional rivals Saudi Arabia and Iran.

Saudi Arabia and neighboring Kuwait jointly claim the offshore Al-Durra gas field. Iran says it has rights to the field, which it refers to as Arash. The two sides held talks in Iran in March but were unable to agree on a border demarcation.

president said that “in recent days, the enemy has been stubbornly attacking cities, city centers, shelling civilian objects and housing.”

“But this terror will not frighten us or break us,” Zelenskyy said in a social media statement.

In the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson, Russian shelling killed another civilian Monday, local authorities said. Several others were reported to be wounded.

Ukraine, meanwhile, has sought to take the war deep into Russia, reportedly using drones to hit targets as far away as Moscow. The latest strike, on Sunday, damaged two office buildings a few miles (kilometers) from the Kremlin.

Ukrainian drone attacks on Russia and Moscow-annexed territory, especially Crimea, have become more frequent recently.

Nasser Kanaani, a spokesman for Iran’s Foreign Ministry, said on Monday that it would not tolerate any infringement on its rights, echoing remarks by the country’s oil minister the previous day. Last week, Kuwait’s oil minister told Sky News Arabia that his country would commence drilling and production without waiting for a deal.

Saudi Arabia has sided with Kuwait, saying the two countries have exclusive ownership of the field, and has called on Iran to return to negotiations.

Saudi Arabia and Iran, which have backed opposite sides in conflicts across the Middle East and accused each other of destabilizing the region, agreed in March to restore diplomatic relations following a seven-year freeze. They have since reopened embassies and welcomed senior officials on visits.

But they continue to back opposite sides in Yemen’s civil war, which is ongoing despite a 15-month cease-fire. Saudi Arabia is also in negotiations with the United States over potentially normalizing relations with Israel, which Iran’s leaders have said should be wiped off the map.

It’s unclear whether the dispute over the gas field, which goes back to the 1960s, will escalate beyond rhetoric. But tensions are already high in the Persian Gulf, where the US is building up military forces in response to what it says is Iran’s unlawful

Hepatitis: Many Pinoys don’t know they have it

World Hepatitis day, observed on July 28 every year, aims to raise global awareness of hepatitis—a group of infectious diseases known as hepatitis A, B, C, d, and E—and encourage prevention, diagnosis and treatment.

To mark World Hepatitis Day this year, the World Health Organization (WHO) is calling all member states to scale up testing and treatment for viral hepatitis, warning that the disease could kill more people than malaria, tuberculosis, and HIV combined by 2040 if current infection trends continue.

Under the theme of “One life, one liver,” WHO’s World Hepatitis Day campaign highlights the importance of protecting the liver against hepatitis for a long, healthy life. Good liver health also benefits other vital organs—including the heart, brain and kidneys—that rely on the liver to function.

Hepatitis causes liver damage and cancer. It kills over a million people annually. Of the five types of hepatitis infections, hepatitis B and C cause most of the disease and deaths. Hepatitis C can be cured. However, only 21 percent of people living with hepatitis C infection are diagnosed, and only 13 percent have received curative treatment. Just 10 percent of people living with chronic hepatitis B are diagnosed, and only 2 percent of those infected are receiving the lifesaving medicine.

“Millions of people are living with undiagnosed and untreated hepatitis worldwide, even though we have better tools than ever to prevent, diagnose and treat it,” said Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General. “WHO remains committed to supporting countries to expand the use of those tools, including increasingly cost-effective curative medication, to save lives and end hepatitis.”

WHO will share new guidance to track countries’ progress on the path to the elimination of hepatitis by 2030. To reduce new infections and deaths from hepatitis B and C, countries must: ensure access to treatment for all pregnant women living with hepatitis B, provide hepatitis B vaccines for their babies at birth, diagnose 90 percent of people living with hepatitis B and/or hepatitis C, and provide treatment to 80 percent of all people diagnosed with hepatitis. They must also act to ensure optimal blood transfusion, safe injections and harm reduction.

WHO said the reduction of hepatitis B infections in children through vaccination is a key intervention to limit viral hepatitis infections overall. The target for hepatitis B incidence is the only Sustainable Development Goals’ (SDG) health target that was met in 2020 and is on track for 2030.

For people who want to maintain liver health, WHO recommends hepatitis testing, treatment if diagnosed, and vaccination against hepatitis B. Reducing alcohol consumption, achieving a healthy weight, and managing diabetes or hypertension also benefit liver health.

In the Philippines, WHO said one in 10 people have chronic hepatitis B, and six in 1,000 have chronic hepatitis C. Hepatitis is a huge public health concern in the country, but due to lack of awareness, many of those who have this viral disease may not even know they have it until it’s too late.

WHO said hepatitis is a silent killer. Caused by a virus that has no symptoms, it quietly damages the liver for decades before ending in liver cancer and cirrhosis (scarring of the liver that reduces its ability to detoxify blood). Deaths due to hepatitis in the Philippines have increased over the past two decades, with 1.4 million lives lost every year. Sadly, Filipinos are still not well informed about the disease.

Without proper care, the two most common types of hepatitis—B and C— cause about 60 percent of liver cancer. This is why liver cancer is one of the top causes of cancer deaths in the Philippines.

Deaths from preventable diseases are unacceptable, and hepatitis is no exception. Nowadays, we can prevent and treat the disease. Hepatitis B vaccine is highly effective when the first dose is given to babies within 24 hours of birth and followed up with two further doses. People living with chronic hepatitis B can be treated with highly effective medicines to stop the disease from progressing and reduce the risk of it developing into liver cancer. People with hepatitis C can now be cured within three months by taking new oral medicines.

It would do well for the government to intensify its information campaign, and scale up hepatitis testing and treatment nationwide because many Filipinos with hepatitis do not know they are infected and thus do not seek treatment.