The Islamic State group claimed responsibility Monday for a suicide bombing in Pakistan that killed at least 54 people, including 23 children, at a political party gathering ahead of elections due later this year.
The blast has raised fears Pakistan could be in for a bloody election period following months of political chaos prompted by the ousting of Imran Khan as prime minister in April last year.
Around 400 members of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-F (JUI-F) party -- a key government coalition partner led by a firebrand cleric -- were waiting Sunday for speeches to begin when a bomber detonated a vest packed with explosives and ball bearings near the front stage.
"I was confronted with a devastating sight -- lifeless bodies scattered on the ground while people cried out for help," Fazal Aman, who was near the tent when the bomb went off, told AFP.
Shaukat Abbas, a senior official with the Counter-terrorism Department (CTD), told AFP that 54 people were killed, including 23 under the age of 18.
On Monday, the IS group claimed responsibility.
"A suicide attacker from the Islamic State... detonated his explosive jacket in the middle of a crowd" in Khar, the jihadist group's news arm Amaq said in a statement.
The attack occurred in the town of Khar in the northwestern Bajaur district, just 45 kilometres (28 miles) from the Afghan border, in an area where militancy has been rising since the Taliban took control of Kabul in 2021.
Parliament is likely to be dissolved after it completes its term in the next two weeks, with national elections to be held by mid-November or earlier.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called on Pakistani authorities to find those responsible for planning the attack and bring them to justice, his spokesman Farhan Haq said.