Mosque in Pakistan

A suicide bomber blew himself up outside a mosque in a suburb of Pakistan’s capital Islamabad on Friday, killing at least 31 people and wounding nearly 170, a city government spokesman said in a message shared with reporters.

A local security official said the attack occurred while the Shiite Muslim mosque was packed with people for Friday prayers.

Images from the scene showed dozens of people lying bloodied on the floor of the Imambargah Khadijatul Kubra mosque in the Tarlai suburb of Islamabad, while others were piled into any available vehicle to be transported to local hospitals.

Children could be seen among the victims.

The security official, who spoke to News themezone on condition of anonymity, noted that there had not been a major attack since a suicide bombing hit a court in Islamabad about two months ago, prompting the alert level in the capital to be raised to the maximum.

“The bombers apparently failed to hit large targets inside the capital and headed for soft targets such as mosques and public places in the suburbs,” the official said.

Witnesses said the attacker was stopped at the door and then blew himself up.

Zahir Hussain told News themezone he was parking to enter the mosque when the massive explosion threw him against the door of his car.

“After that, for a while there was an awful silence, then what I saw in the mosque, I have no words to explain it,” Hussain said.

Police and emergency services declared an emergency in Islamabad hospitals. Authorities said the nearby PIMS hospital had already reached capacity when the victims arrived and that some of the injured were being transferred to other hospitals in the capital and neighboring Rawalpindi.

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif met the country’s interior minister and ordered an investigation into the attack.

Sharif promised in a statement that those responsible would be brought to justice and that no one would be allowed to spread hatred and insecurity in the country.

No one immediately claimed responsibility and officials did not name suspects.

Pakistan has faced violent attacks by several regional terrorist groups, including the Afghan and Pakistani Taliban, neither of which frequently attack Shia Muslims, and ISIS’s regional affiliate, ISIS-Khorasan (ISIS-K), and others who have attacked civilians and security forces indiscriminately.