ISLAMABAD - At least three people were killed and over 20 others injured when a blast derailed a passenger train in Pakistan's southern area of Jacobabad early Wednesday morning, said railway officials and local media.

The incident took place at about 00: 45 am local time when a train heading for the southern port city of Karachi from the northern city of Peshawar got derailed while moving on a railway track blown up by militants in Jacobabad, a district in the northern tip of Sindh province in southern Pakistan.

At least two compartments of the train derailed, said local railway officials.

Security forces, police and railway employees took part in the rescue work.

Militants in Pakistan often blast railway tracks with the aim to hit the trains moving on them, but in most cases such blasts missed the targets of the trains due to poor timing, only leaving railway tracks destroyed.