The deadly wave of violence receded across Pakistan during the current week. Meanwhile, the spate of ethno-political violence in the largest metropolis, Karachi, surged substantially during the week, wherein 45 persons (33 in the last week) were shot dead. Also, the wave of bomb blasts across the country, spree of target killings and the recovery of mutilated dead bodies continued to mount death toll during the week. The data collected through10 newspapers that CRSS uses as the source, indicates that as many as 101 persons lost their lives as a result of 73 violent incidents around the country during the reported week (for detailssee data sheet). The violent incidents also left 45 people injured.

Like in case of last week, civilians again bore the major brunt of the ongoing spate of violence across Pakistan during the current week, wherein civilians accounted foralmost 84 percent of the total death toll. Numerically, 85 civilians were killed and 19 others were wounded in violent clashes of various kinds in the country. The second highest number of fatalities was ofmilitants, wherein 10 militants got killed under different circumstances. Furthermore, no CIA operated drone strike was reported during the week in any part of the country. Meanwhile thesabotage campaign by the militants continued to demolish state infrastructure and undermine stability as militants attacked two school buses, a cellular tower, blew up three houses, five government schools and blew up seven shops in different parts of KP.

Meanwhile, 12 sectarian attacksleft 13 dead, including one in KP and 12 in Karachi. Moreover, the loss of lives due to target killings increased by 16 percent, (57 percent of the total dead against last week 41 percent) during the current week. Overall, 43 percent of the total violent attacks wereoftarget killingin nature(seethe pie chart below).

Furthermore, data underlines that of the total 32 incidents of target killings; 81 percent took place in Karachi alone, decimating 40 persons (69 percent of the total dead in target killings). Meanwhile 10 militants were killed in different incidents across the country. On the whole, militant casualties were nine percent of the total death toll. Also, six security personnel were killed and 16 others were injured during the week.

Moreover, 19 bullet-riddled dead bodies were recovered, of which three from FATA, five from KP, eight from Karachi and three from Balochistan. In sum, the number of violent incidents increased from last week 50 to 73 during this week, the resultant death toll, significantly decreased from 251 to 101 during the current week, while the number of wounded also decreased from 457 to 46. A concise look into the trends and territory of violence suggests that the deadly spate of ethno-political and sectarian violence continues to rip apart the security landscape in the economic hub of Pakistan, Karachi.

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