Car Bomb Kills 11 in Southwest Pakistan

A car bomb killed at least eleven people on Wednesday and wounded 22 more in a Shiite Muslim area of the restive southwestern Pakistani city of Quetta, police said.

The bomb exploded in a parking lot after prayers marking the festival of Eid al-Fitr, senior police official Mohammad Hashim told Agence France Presse.

"The bomb was planted in a car and an unidentified man parked it at the site and left," Hashim said.

Hashim said there had been no immediate claim of responsibility and police could not speculate who might be behind the bombing.

One woman was among the dead brought to hospital, said hospital official Rasheed Jamali.

Witnesses said that several cars parked nearby caught fire from the blast, and a house was damaged. The area is populated by members of the minority Shiite Muslim group.

Live television footage showed swirls of thick black smoke as people ran into the street, some pushing their cars to safety, while ambulances carried away the wounded.

Pakistan's Baluchistan province, of which Quetta is the capital, has seen a recent surge in violence linked to a separatist insurgency, sectarian clashes and Taliban militants.