On 18 September 2009, a suicide car bombing killed at least 39 people in Usterzai, Pakistan.[1][2]
At 11am on 18 September 2009, a suicide car bombing took place at Kacha Pakha bazaar village market at a busy intersection, badly damaging Hikmat Ali hotel, as well as a restaurant and shops, causing some to collapse.[1][2] It happened in a Shia Muslim area of Usterzai, North-West Frontier Province, Pakistan, five and a half years after the war in northwest Pakistan began.[1][2] The attack killed at least 39 people and injured another 54, most of whom are believed to have been members of Pakistan's Shia minority, who are often targeted by extremists among the majority Sunni Muslims.[1][2]
A group calling itself Lahskar-e-Jhangvi al-Almi says it carried out the attack, in revenge for the killing of a prominent religious leader, Maulana M Amin, in Hangu, NWFP, three months earlier.[1] They are believed to be linked to Taliban-linked Sunni supremacist group Lashkar-e-Jhangvi.[1]
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