The overall level of violence further escalated across Pakistan during the current week. Meanwhile, the unending spate of ethno-political violence in the largest metropolis, Karachi, however substantially receeded during the week, wherein almost 19 persons (48 were dead in the last week) were perished and another 34 got injured. Also, the wave of bomb blasts across the country, armed clashes between militants and the security forces in Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) and the recovery of mutilated dead bodies continued to pile up death toll during the week. The data collected throughten newspapers that CRSS uses as the source, indicates that as many as 92 persons lost their lives as a result of 48 violent incidents across the country during the reported week (for detailssee data sheet).The violent incidents also left 182 people injured.

Like the preceding week, yet again, the civilians turned out to be the major victims of the persistent wave of violence across Pakistan during the week, as civilians accounted for 71 percent of the total fatalities across Pakistan. Numerically speaking, 66 civilians lost their lives and 141 others were wounded in violent clashes of various kinds across the country. The second highest number of casualties was ofsecurity forces personnel, wherein 16 forces personnel were killed and another 29 got injured in violent clashes. Furthermore, for fourth week in a row no CIA operated drone strikewas recorded in any part of the country. Also no significant sabotage attack was reported in any part of the country this week; however three schools were blown up by the militants in Tank, Charsadda and Kotkai areas of KP and FATA.

Death toll due to sectarian violence further surged during the week, as seven sectarian attacksleft 30 Shia men dead, and another 98 injured in different areas of Karachi (Sindh), Rawalpindi (Punjab) and Quetta (Balochistan). Meanwhile, the loss of lives due to target killings dropped by 35 percent, (29 percent of the total dead against last week 64 percent) during the current week. Overall, 50 percent of the total violent attacks wereoftarget killingin nature.The trend also suggests that target killing insistently remains the preferred weapon in the hands of miscreants to inflict violence (seethe pie chart below).

Furthermore, data underlines that of the total 24 incidents of target killings; a staggering 37 percent took place in Karachi alone, decimating 12 people (44 percent of the total dead in target killings) and injuring five others. Death toll of the militants in the ongoing military operations in KP and FATA region further dropped by seven percent; militant casualties due to military operation accounted for just seven percent of the total fatalities against last week 14 percent. Overall, ten militants were killed and twelve others got injured during the week.

Also, seven dead bodies were recovered from Karachi (Sindh),Turbat, Lasbela, (Balochistan) and Matani (Peshawar) areas. In sum, the number of violent incidents dropped from last week 61 to 48 during this week, the resultant death toll however surged from 84 to 92 during the current week, while the number of wounded increased from 116 to 182.

A peer into the data and violent trends underline that sectarian violence around the country and ethno-political killing in Karachi continue to mount death toll. Attacks on processions held in commemoration of Moharram rituals by Shia men in Quetta, Karachi and Rawalpindi, at a time when world Muslim leaders were in Islamabad to attend D-8 Summit, once again sabotaged attempts of Pakistani government to showcase the state as a peaceful entity. A steep surge in violence across Pakistan during the week predicts more bloody times for the state and Shia people, when the latter will take large processions during Moharram.

Sources

1. The News
2. Dawn
3. The Express Tribune
4. Pakistan Today
5. Daily Times
6. The Frontier Post
7. Jang (Urdu)
8. Daily Mashriq (Urdu)
9. Aaj (Urdu)
10. The Nation