MUSCAT: Oman has strongly condemned the terrorist attack on Indian  reserve police convoy in Kashmir. 

In a statement issued by Oman’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Sultanate has condemned the attack, reiterated its solidarity and expressed its condolence to victims’ families.

According to Indian media reports, in one of the deadliest attacks by militant on security forces in Kashmir, at least 41 Central Reserve Police Force personnel were killed when a suicide bomber rammed his car, laden with explosives, into the CRPF convoy on the Srinagar-Jammu highway on Thursday.

Militant outfit Jaish-e-Mohammad has claimed responsibility for the attack that also left many troopers injured.

While CRPF officials have been tightlipped about the attack, a senior police official from south Kashmir said that at least 41 jawans were killed. “Many more jawans are injured, some of them serious. We are collecting the details,” the official said.

“The number of casualties is expected to rise,” another police official said, adding that the injured were evacuated to the Indian Army’s 92-base Hospital at Badami Bagh cantonment in Srinagar. According to the official, more than 20 injured CRPF troopers were being treated at the army hospital.

A CRPF convoy was on its way to Srinagar from Jammu when an SUV laden with explosives rammed into the bus carrying jawans at around 3:20 pm, near Lethpora in Pulwama. “Two buses carrying the troopers were the target,” the police official said.

The explosion reduced the bus to a mangled heap of iron. According to some media reports, the car was laden with 350 kg of explosives when it hit the CRPF bus.

The first official statement from the Ministry of External Affairs condemned the “cowardly terrorist attack” in the “strongest terms”.