Two people were killed in a car bomb attack on an American fast food restaurant in the southern Pakistan city of Karachi early today.
Some of the 15 wounded suffered severe burns, hospital doctors and police said. No one had claimed responsibility for the attack, Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed said.
Pakistani Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed
The blast occurred in central Karachi just before 9 a.m. local time, gutting the restaurant and shattering the windows of a nearby six-storey office block housing several oil and gas exploration firms.
The restaurant was closed at the time of the blast.
"We have two confirmed deaths. Initially there were reports that four to six people were killed in the blast but luckily only two people were killed," Mughal said, adding the two killed were security guards for Muslim Commercial Bank.
An ambulance crew member for the Edhi Foundation, Pakistan's largest charity, said six bodies had been taken to hospital, but doctors there said only two were dead, though six of the casualties admitted were in a critical condition.
Two other KFC restaurants, a Pakistani franchise of the global food chain owned by YUM Brands Inc, have been the targets of attacks in Karachi in recent months.