Bomb blasts at mosques in Pakistan leave 71 dead

Two explosions killed at least 71 people in mosques in Pakistan's north-west yesterday, officials said, after a relative lull in militant violence.

In the worst attack, a suicide bomber blew himself up as Friday prayers were ending, killing at least 66 people, provincial government officials said. The attack occurred in Darra Adam Khel, a suburb of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province capital Peshawar.

"The death toll is 66. It may rise because several injured are in critical condition," Shahid Ullah, a senior provincial government official, said, adding that 80 people were wounded. Some 300 people had gathered just after prayers when the bomber walked into the Waali Mosque's main hall and detonated himself, witnesses said.

"I had just finished the prayers when there was a big explosion. It was terrifying.

"I don't know what happened after. I just fell down," Mohib Ullah, 15, said.

Officials said the mosque was owned by a pro-government tribal elder who could have been the target of the attack but it was not clear whether he was hit.

It was the biggest attack in Pakistan since a September suicide bomb attack on a procession of Shiite Muslims in the southwestern city of Quetta, which killed 54 people.