World: A car bomb blast late on Wednesday ripped through a luxury hotel’s parking area in the southwestern Pakistani city of Quetta, killing four people and wounding 12, officials reported.
The hotel Serena located in the city of Quetta, the capital of Balochistan hosted China Ambassador to Pakistan. According to Pakistan’s interior minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed, four were dead and 12 injured in the attack. He also informed that the Chinese Ambassador Nong Rong and his envoy were safe and weren’t on the premises during the blast.
Resentment has been fuelled by billions of dollars of Chinese money flowing into the region through the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) — a key part of China’s Belt and Road Initiative — which locals say gave them little benefit as most new jobs went to outsiders.
Azhar Ikram, a senior police official in the city suspects an IED was planted in one of the vehicles parked in the hotel premises.
As per the records; In 2019, gunmen stormed a luxury hotel overlooking a flagship CPEC project the deep-water seaport in Gwadar that gives China strategic access to the Arabian Sea killing at least eight people. Later in June, Baloch insurgents targeted the Pakistan Stock Exchange, which is partly owned by Chinese companies.