At least 45 people were killed Monday when a powerful explosion ripped through a Pakistani hospital, officials said, as witnesses described tearful staff rushing towards the smoking blast site to help dozens of wounded.
The explosion in the Balochistan provincial capital Quetta came as up to 200 people gathered at the Civil Hospital after the fatal shooting of a senior local lawyer, AFP reporters on the scene said.
An AFP journalist said he was approximately 20 metres (65 feet) away when the explosion occurred.
"There were huge black clouds and dirt," he said.
Pervez Masi, who was injured by pieces of flying glass, said the blast was so powerful that "we didn't know what had happened".
Police and officials have said the blast appeared to be a suicide attack but added they are still investigating.
"There are at least 45 confirmed dead and around 50 injured," said Rehmat Saleh Baloch, health minister for Balochistan, updating earlier figures.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for either the blast or the shooting of the lawyer. But militant groups in the province routinely target security forces and government installations.
The crowd, mainly lawyers and journalists, had gone to the hospital after the death of the president of the Balochistan Bar Association in a shooting earlier Monday, provincial home secretary Akbar Harifal told AFP.
Many of the dead appeared to be wearing black suits and ties, the traditional uniform of lawyers in Pakistan.
The military has been deployed in and around the city's hospitals, Baloch said.
The blast is the second deadliest in Pakistan this year so far, after a bombing in a crowded park in Lahore over Easter killed 75.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif condemned the bombing and ordered authorities to tighten security.
"No one will be allowed to disturb peace in the province that has been restored due to countless sacrifices of security forces, police and the people," his statement said.
Pakistani hospitals have been targeted by militants previously.
In 2010 a bomb killed 13 people outside the casualty department of a hospital in Karachi in Sindh province, where victims of an earlier attack were being treated as anxious relatives gathered.