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Scores Killed In Apparent Suicide Attack Near India-Pakistan Border

Locals crowd around the bodies of the victims of a suicide bomb attack, at a hospital in Lahore, on Sunday.
Rahat Dar EPA/Landov
Locals crowd around the bodies of the victims of a suicide bomb attack, at a hospital in Lahore, on Sunday.

Updated at 10:55 a.m. ET

A suspected suicide bomb attack on the Pakistani side of a tense border post with India has killed at least 45 people and wounded another 100, a senior official says.

"According to initial information it was a suicide attack," Inspector General of Punjab Police, Mushtaq Sukhera, told local television channels, according to Reuters.

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"When ... security was a bit relaxed, the suicide attacker blew himself up near a restaurant," Sukhera said, who said many were more were wounded.

He said on Pakistan television (PTV) that 45 were dead and about 100 others wounded.

NPR's Philip Reeves reports that "Local hospitals are struggling to cope with the many dozens of injured; women, children, and paramilitary police are reportedly among the dead. Pakistan's Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's ordered an investigation, and has expressed his deep sorrow."

Reuters quotes an Ashok Kumar, inspector-general of India's Border Security Force as saying that the Indian side of the Wagah border crossing is secure.

"Our side is safe, we are alert, have increased our security, we are in constant touch with district officials and state police," Kumar said, according to Reuters.

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The attack occurred near Wagah, where crowds of spectators from both India and Pakistan gather nightly to watch goose-stepping border guards perform a ritualized and choreographed routine aimed at intimidation.

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