MASTUNG: At least two soldiers were killed when a roadside bomb hit a paramilitary van escorting a bus of Shia Muslim pilgrims in the Mastung district of Balochistan on Saturday, officials said.

The incident took place in Dringhar area, on the main Quetta-Taftan Highway in Mastung district, some 50 kilometres southwest of Quetta.

“The bomb exploded after a Frontier Corps (FC) vehicle stopped to check a parked car,” Sayed Mehrab Shah, a senior government official in Mastung told AFP.

All the pilgrims on the bus, who were on their way to Iran, were safe but several security personnel were wounded by the remotely triggered bomb, Shah said.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the blast but most attacks in the oil-and gas-rich province bordering Afghanistan and Iran have been linked to a decade-long Baloch separatist insurgency or sectarian violence.

Abdul Wasay, spokesman for the paramilitary Frontier Corps, confirmed the attack.

Meanwhile, a heavy contingent of security personnel cordoned off the site of incident and investigations into the attack went underway.