The police chief of Quetta in Pakistan has been dismissed after a suicide assault on a city mosque killed as many as 50 worshippers.
Rehmatullah Niazi and two of his officers were asked to step down after four attackers stormed the Shiite Muslim mosque during Friday prayers.
The assailants threw hand grenades and sprayed bullets at the people inside until they were killed by security guards.
Seventeen people have been arrested for questioning, and authorities are investigating the possibility that al-Qaida and Taliban fugitives hiding out in border regions may have been behind the attack.
The victims were ethnic Hazaras - a minority that also lives in Afghanistan and was often at odds with the former Taliban regime.
