Bomb Rips Through Park Crowded With Kids on Easter

At least 50 reported dead outside Lahore, Pakistan
By Newser Editors and Wire Services
Posted Mar 27, 2016 11:30 AM CDT
Bomb Rips Through Park Crowded With Kids on Easter
A Christian girl prays during an Easter service at St Anthony's Church in Lahore, Pakistan, Sunday, March 27, 2016. A suicide bomber detonated at a park outside Lahore later in the day.   (AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)

A health official says that at least 50 people have been killed and 91 wounded in a blast in a park in the eastern Pakistani city of Lahore, reports the AP. Salman Rafiq, an adviser to the chief minister of Punjab province, said Sunday that many of the wounded are in a critical condition and that the death toll might rise. Senior police officer Haider Ashraf says the explosion took place close to the children's rides in Gulshan-e-Iqbal park, and appeared to have been a suicide bombing, but investigations were ongoing. The area was crowded with Christians celebrating the Easter holidays who may have been targeted, notes the BBC. Many of the dead and injured are reportedly women and children. (Pope Francis denounced such attacks in his Easter Mass on Sunday.)

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