QUETTA, Pakistan (AP) — Many Pakistanis were in deep mourning on Tuesday, a day after a suicide bombing that targeted lawyers killed 70 people in the city of Quetta, touching a chord in the country’s culture war.

By targeting lawyers, Islamic radicals appeared to take aim at a pillar of the country’s budding civil society – and a symbol of the supremacy of secular law in a modern state.

Across the country, many courts were closed and lawyers staged rallies in support of their colleagues. But in Quetta, the capital of the southwestern province of Baluchistan, the streets were deserted. Shops were shuttered, and markets and schools closed to mourn those killed.

“People are scared, and they ask, ‘for how long the violence will continue?’” said Mohammad Saleem, who works at the market.

Senior attorney Mohammad Ashraf stood with several fellow lawyers outside a Quetta court building, a spot where he had often gathered for breaks with many of the lawyers killed in the bombing. The perpetrators “cannot be called humans,” he said with anger.

Tariq Lodhi, a former head of Pakistan’s main civil spy agency, told the Associated Press that the attack was carried out by militants to “terrorize lawyers and judges,” who are handling cases involving militants accused of carrying out attacks in the country.