Twin suicide attacks hit Pakistan’s Quetta

At least 24 people were killed Wednesday and scores of others wounded when suicide bombers attacked the residence of a military official in the Pakistani city of Quetta.

Senior police official Hamid Shakil said the first attacker detonated a car bomb near the vehicle of the city's Frontier Corps chief,Farrukh Shahzad.

The second bomber entered Shahzad's house and blew himself up five minutes later.

Quetta is a strategic town in Baluchistan province, which borders Afghanistan and Iran.

The corps are a paramilitary force battling militants on the Afghan border, and four of the dead were reportedly among its members.

Al Jazeera reported that Shahzad was wounded in the attack, while his wife and two of his children were killed. Seven security guards were also among the dead.

Shakil told Agence France-Presse that at least 44 people were injured in the explosions, with the number of dead expected to rise.

It was a twin suicide attack. The house was badly damaged. The deputy inspector general himself is injured.

The Taliban has claimed responsibility. It's spokesman Ehsanulla Ehsan confirmed that Shahzad was the target, to avenge his role in killing of five Chechens in May by Pakistani forces in Quetta's Khrotabad area.

The BBC reported that militants linked to al-Qaeda and the Taliban, as well as ethnic Baloch militants, were active in the area.

The army said the Frontier Corps also took part in an operation in which senior al-Qaeda leaders were arrested earlier this week.