Nepal explosion: Four dead after TRIPLE BLAST in Kathmandu
FOUR people have been killed and seven others injured following three separate explosions in the Nepal capital of Kathmandu.
Nepal: Police respond to explosion in Kathmandu
Police have confirmed an investigation is underway and said they suspected a Maoist splinter group may have been responsible. Official Shyam Lal Gyawali said: "Three people were killed on the spot and the fourth one died while undergoing treatment at a hospital.” One person was killed in an explosion inside a house in the Ghattekulo residential area in the heart of the city.
Three people died in the second blast which took place near a hairdresser’s in the ukedhara area on the outskirts of the city.
A photographer from global news agency Reuters, who was at the site, said it had shattered the door and window panes of the shop, and the area had been sealed off by the army.
The third explosion went off near a brick kiln in the Thankot area of Kathmandu, injuring two people.
All seven injured peopler were taken to hospital.
One witness said: “I heard a big noise and rushed to the spot to find the walls of a house had developed cracks due to the impact of the blast.”
No one has claimed responsibility for either of the explosions.
But Mr Gyawali, the Nepali police official, said they suspect the blasts may have been the work of a splinter group of former Maoist rebels who are opposed to the Government for arresting its supporters.
He said: "A pamphlet from the group has been found at the site of the first blast.”
He added the house was used to make improvised or crude explosive devices by activists from the group, with one of the injured people being a supporter.
Nepal emerged from a decade-long Maoist civil war in 2006 and the main group of the former rebels has joined the party that runs the government.
The breakaway group of former rebels carried out a similar blast in Kathmandu in February in which one person was killed and two others were injured.