The little boy killed at the market

The Hussains are one of many families in mourning
 after Saturday's bomb attack in the city of Parachinar
 in north-western Pakistan.

One of the poorest in the area, the family depends on
 wages earned by Jamil Hussain, a labourer in Karachi,
 and his 15-year- old son, Sabil Hussain, who works
 at a poultry shop in Parachinar.

Sabil's younger brother, Altaf, 12, takes a handcart to the 
city's vegetable market each morning which he hires
 to traders who buy vegetables at auction and need to 
move them to their shops.

Until last Saturday, his eight-year-old brother, Zain 
Haider, used to go with him to the market to scavenge 
leftover vegetables for the family kitchen.

On Saturday, while Zain was stuffing the vegetable waste
 into a shopping bag, Altaf was asked by a trader to cart
 his merchandise and he told Zain to wait for him there.

Minutes later the bomb went off, blowing smoke, dust and 
bits of shattered crates and vegetables into the air.

"Altaf couldn't return to find Zain immediately because
 there was a commotion and people were running helter-skelter all over the place," says Sabil Hussain, whose 
poultry shop is 10 minute ' walk from the site of the blast.

"Half an hour later I went home to find Altaf in a state
 of shock.

He was pale. He said he couldn't find Zain but was able to
 find his shoes, a pair of worn-out trainers, which he
 brought home."

Zain was proclaimed dead at a hospital where local 
transport had rushed all the dead and injured.

Twenty-five people were killed on the spot.

The attack is the eighth major bombing in Parachinar 
since 2007.

More than 500 people have died in these attacks. Many
 more have been killed in smaller attacks.

"By this count, Parachinar is the second most frequently targeted city by the militants after Peshawar," says Haji 
Faqir Hussain, the head of a council of elders of local tribes.


War with Taliban

Saturday's blast came weeks after the head of a 
Pakistan Army brigade stationed in the region directed
 local tribes to hand over heavy weapons to the 
government by early February.

The semi-autonomous tribal areas of Pakistan turned
 into large privately owned dumps of heavy weapons 
which proliferated because of the Afghan war in the 1980s.

The two tribes of Kurram - the Turi and the Bangash 
- own scores of light and heavy machine-guns, rocket-propelled grenades and even a few anti-aircraft guns, 
held in community- managed stockpiles in several
 locations along the border of Kurram Agency, where Parachinar is the main town.

The tribes are reluctant to part with their weapons for
 two reasons.

First, Kurram is the only one among Pakistan's seven 
semi- autonomous tribal districts which is inhabited by Shia Muslims.
The district is surrounded on three sides by Afghan territory
where elements linked to the Pakistani Taliban and the so-called Islamic State group have carved sanctuaries. 

These element adhere to a hard-line Sunni version of 
Islam which is fiercely anti- Shia.

They see Shias as heretics and consider it their sacred 
duty to eliminate them from the face of the Earth.

The district has also faced similar threats from Pakistani territory to the east, which until 2014 served as a sanctuary 
for Sunni hardline militant groups.

During 2007-8, the Turi and Bangash tribes of Kurram 
fought a protracted war against the Pakistani Taliban to prevent them from over-running Kurram and capturing strategic routes to attack the Afghan capital, Kabul, just 
over 90km (55 miles) north-west of the western tip of Kurram.

They have also conducted short expeditions against
 Sunni tribes in the west to secure their border against attempts by Sunni militants to infiltrate from there.

Second, there are lingering doubts about both the
 intentions and the ability of the military to defend them.

"Even though the military claims that they can defend us, 
we can't forget that we were left to our own devices when
 the Taliban captured our areas and tried to force their
 way to Parachinar," one local elder said.

"And [the military] still continue to back some Taliban 
groups, who lurk on our border and may at any time in 
future want to force their way to our western border
 for their war on Kabul."


'We won't surrender arms'

Haji Faqir Hussain says that giving up their weapons 
would amount to "stripping ourselves of our only 
means of survival".

"We are surrounded by the Taliban and Daesh [IS] like 
the torture [is surrounded] by teeth. We have never 
acted against the interests of the government, and we 
can't fight it, but we want them to know that parting
 with our weapons would mean that we are surrendering
 our women and children to the enemy with the permission 
to do with them what they want."

People in Kurram refer to Saturday's bombing as proof 
that they are still not safe against anti-Shia militants. 

There is also a fear that the government may blame the bombing on Shias and thereby force them to surrender
 their arms.

"On Sunday they arrested seven people in connection with
 the bombing, but most of them are local Turi tribesmen engaged in small-time vegetable businesses," says Sajid Hussain Turi, a member of the national parliament from Kurram.

"We condemn these arrests. They should be looking 
for Taliban who claimed responsibility for the attack."


'Dad doesn't know'

While the Shia tribes of Kurram are lobbying to keep 
their weapons, the family of little Zain Haider is trying 
to come to terms with its own problems.

"My father has a tough life in Karachi, and it's long
 distance travel involving lots of money (Karachi is 
1,400km south of Parachinar).

So we haven't told him [about Zain's death]," says Sabil Hussain.

For the moment, he is struggling to take care of his
 mother, whose blood sugar levels have been unstable 
since Zain's death.

And the fact that her husband doesn't know is also 
playing on her mind.


will they tell him?

"As time goes by, it will become harder, but we'll have to 
take it how it comes," says Sabil.