ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Islamic militants blew up a bus carrying female university students in Baluchistan Province in southwestern Pakistan on Saturday and then attacked a hospital complex where the wounded had been taken and local officials had gathered to comfort them, leaving at least 23 people dead.

Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, a banned sectarian group with links to Al Qaeda, claimed responsibility for the attacks in Quetta, the provincial capital.

The violence shook the newly formed government led by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, who is trying to revive Pakistan’s foundering economy while grappling with an array of militant violence.

Earlier Saturday, separatists in another part of the province destroyed a historic building that was once used by the country’s founding leader. The mayhem in Quetta began when a bomb tore through a bus that was carrying students from Sardar Bahadur Khan University. The blast killed at least 14 women and wounded at least 19 others. It destroyed the bus, leaving behind a charred metal shell.