PESHAWAR, Pakistan, Feb. 24 (UPI) -- Two Pakistani security guards died in a suicide bomb attack near the Iranian consulate in Peshawar but no consular personnel were injured, authorities said.
At least 11 more people were wounded in the Monday attack. A security official told the New York Times no one inside the consulate or the nearby residence of the Iranian consul general was hurt.
The report quoted Peshawar police chief Ijaz Khan as saying heavy security outside the consulate led the attacker to turn toward a nearby tent camp of the paramilitary security personnel.
"The constabulary warned him to stop and fired at him. In the meantime, he blew himself up, killing one of the men on the spot; the other succumbed to his injuries later," Khan said.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility. But Peshawar, the capital of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province, has been the scene of much violence by the Taliban in recent months.
The latest attack came on the same day when gunmen in the North Waziristan tribal area shot and killed Asmatullah Shaheen Bhittani, a top commander of the Pakistani Taliban, and three of his aides as they drove in a car. Asmatullah had been an interim chief of the group after Hakimullah Mehsud was killed in a drone strike last November.
