Pakistan landmine blast kills 10 including 6 children

At least 10 people, including six children, were killed on Tuesday (25 April) when a landmine exploded in Pakistan's Kurram Agency. The victims were travelling in a passenger van when the vehicle hit the explosive in a tribal area.

The mine was planted by militants close to the border with Afghanistan. Two of the deceased victims were census workers.

Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), the media wing of the Pakistani army, said an army helicopter has been deployed to airlift the injured victims to hospitals in other locations. More than a dozen people are thought to have been wounded in the explosion.

"An anti-tank mine was buried on the roadside and hit a pick-up van. It was a rutted path in an area that is at a distance," a local government official told the Express Tribune.

Though the initial reports suggested it was a minor bombing that killed one woman, the death toll was quickly revised.

"When the passengers were coming, they detonated the remote-controlled bomb," Shahid Ali Khan, assistant political agent for Kurram Agency, told a local news outlet the News.

Census workers involved in country's largest the enumeration exercise have been targeted by Islamists ever since the process began in mid-March. Undeterred Islamabad authorities have reiterated that the census would be completed as per the schedule despite the threats posed by the militants.