At least four people killed after gunmen attack Pakistan Stock Exchange in Karachi
- Karachi police chief Ghulam Nabi Memon said the attackers pulled up in a car outside the trading floor and hurled a grenade at the building before opening fire
- Heavily armed special forces surrounded the building located in the heart of the city’s financial district
The city’s police force had earlier said six people died in the firefight but later revised the figure. A Karachi hospital where the bodies were taken confirmed the new death toll.
Separatist insurgents from the troubled southwestern province of Balochistan claimed responsibility, a senior counterterrorism official, Raja Umar Khattab, said. The Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) had claimed responsibility in a post on Twitter.
“They had come to carry out an attack inside the building and take hostages inside,” the director general of the Sindh Rangers, a paramilitary force, Omer Ahmed Bukhari, told media, adding all attackers had been killed within eight minutes.
The police chief of Karachi, Pakistan’s biggest city and financial hub, Ghulam Nabi Memon, said the gunmen attacked with grenades and guns after pulling up in a silver Corolla car.