ISLAMABAD (AP) — Pakistan will pay $2.58 million to the families of five Chinese engineers killed in March when a suicide bomber attacked the vehicle they were in in the northwest, the finance ministry said.
The Chinese were attacked in the town of Bisham as they headed to the Dasu Dam, Pakistan’s largest, where they were working.
The ministry said in a statement Thursday evening that the government will also pay $8,950 to the family of the Pakistani driver who also died in the March 26 attack.
The government says the attack was planned in Afghanistan and that the bomber was an Afghan national. The Afghan Taliban government and Pakistani militants have denied the allegations.
The compensation was approved at a meeting chaired by Finance Minister Mohammad Aurangzeb, the statement said.
Thousands of Chinese are working on projects related to the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor. Some have been attacked in recent years by militants who accuse them of plundering mineral resources.
