Islamabad, 26 March 2024 (dpa/MIA) – At least six people including five Chinese workers were killed when a suicide bomber rammed into their vehicle in north-western Pakistan, officials said on Tuesday.

The incident took place near Bisham district of the volatile Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province bordering Afghanistan.

“At least five Chinese were killed in the suicide attack,” Gul Naeem, a local police official told dpa.

The dead included the Pakistani driver of the van.

Naeem said that a convoy carrying Chinese workers and engineers along with their security details was on its way to Dasu, where a Chinese hydropower plant is under construction, when a car coming from the opposite direction hit their vehicle. The area is part of the Gilgit-Baltistan region.

No group has claimed responsibility for the attack so far, but Islamist militants linked with the Pakistani Taliban, who are different from their Afghan counterparts, and nationalist rebels often target Chinese interests in Pakistan.

In 2021, at least seven Chinese workers with a hydro power project were killed in the same region when a roadside bomb hit their bus.

The north-western region that shares a border with Afghanistan has seen a steady rise in violence staged by the militants since the Afghan Taliban takeover of Afghanistan in 2021.

The latest attack comes days after suicide bombers rammed an explosive-laden car into a military checkpoint, killing at least seven soldiers in the deadliest attack since last month's national election.

Beijing is building the Dasu hydropower project in the district of Kohistan under an investment plan that forms part of the Belt and Road Initiative, a flagship economic and infrastructure programme of Chinese President Xi Jinping.

MIA file photo