ISIS claims responsibility for attack on Pakistan police college that killed at least 59

Pakistani rescue workers transport an attack victim, after a terrorist attack on a police academy, in Quetta on Oct 25, 2016. PHOTO: AFP

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - Militant group Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) on Tuesday (Oct 25) claimed responsibility for an attack on a police academy in the Pakistani city of Quetta, in which masked gunmen killed at least 59 people and wounded more than 100.

The attack was carried out by "Islamic State fighters", the group's Amaq news agency said.

More than 200 police trainees were stationed at the facility when the attack occurred late on Monday, officials said. Some cadets were taken hostage during the attack, which lasted five hours. Most of the dead were police cadets.

"Militants came directly into our barrack. They just barged in and started firing point blank. We started screaming and running around in the barrack," one cadet who survived told local media.

Mr Mir Sarfaraz Bugti, home minister of Baluchistan province, of which Quetta is the capital, said the gunmen attacked a dormitory inside the training facility while cadets rested and slept.

"Two attackers blew up themselves while a third one was shot in the head by security men," Mr Bugti said. Earlier officials said there were five to six gunmen.

A Reuters photographer at the scene said the authorities carried out the body of a teenage boy who they said was one of the attackers and had been shot dead by security forces.

In August, ISIS claimed responsibility for an attack on a gathering of mourners at a hospital in Quetta that killed 70 people. But that attack was also claimed by Pakistani Taleban faction Jamaat-ur-Ahrar.

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