Suicide bombers kill 6 police, wound 8 troops in Pakistan

QUETTA, Pakistan (AP) — Suicide bombers struck a police vehicle and a security checkpoint in separate attacks Tuesday in the Pakistani city of Quetta, killing six police and wounding eight paramilitary troops, officials said.

A suicide bomber on a motorcycle rammed into a police vehicle on an airport road, killing the six police and wounding seven others, said Abdur Razzaq Cheema, the Quetta police chief.

Separately, a military statement said two suicide bombers targeted a checkpoint outside a Frontier Corps base in the Mian Ghundi area.

Cheema and the military said the paramilitary fighters killed both suicide bombers. But Mohammad Aslam, another police officer, said eight troops were hospitalized, indicating that one or both attackers detonated his explosives vest.

Hizbul Ahrar, an offshoot of the Pakistani Taliban, claimed both attacks. Islamic extremists regularly target security forces and minority Shiites in Quetta and the surrounding province.

"We are in a warlike situation," Cheema said at the scene of the attack on the police vehicle. "Security forces are on alert and we have to win this war."