The series of deadly bomb attacks
continues in Pakistan, after
at least 20 people were killed Tuesday in two bomb blasts in Pakistan’s eastern city of Lahore,
the second largest Pakistani city after the capital, Islamabad.
The first explosion took place at
a federal police building downtown Lahore,
and it may have been a suicide attack, according to some police officials. Most
of the victims died in this attack at the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) at
9:25 a.m. local time. FIA official Mirza Mohammed Yasin told reporters that the
explosion was caused by a bomb placed near an elevator inside the building, BBC
reports.
Rizwan Baseer, the head of the
provincial government’s rescue agency, said 18 people had been killed in FIA
explosion. A hospital official said that about 50 people were wounded.
Officials also fear that the death toll can rise, if they don’t manage to take
out the people trapped under the debris.
“We’re trying to evacuate the
wounded trapped under the debris,” said Tariq Pervez, the director general of
the FIA. They also fear that the building might collapse anytime.
Television showed images from Lahore, in which the
multi-storey building was badly damaged, vehicles were charred and trees uprooted.
The second explosion was caused
by a car bomb at an advertising agency in a residential neighborhood in Lahore about six miles
away. Mian Ejaz, the City Administrator, said that it killed two children,
Times Online informs.
Despite the terror attacks,
President Pervez Musharraf said: “Acts of terrorism cannot deter government’s
resolve to fight the scourge with full force.”
Pursuant to the attacks, the
Australian cricket team cancelled an upcoming tour to Pakistan, over
security grounds. The suicide bomb attacks have killed 600 people in Pakistan this
year.
Last week, two suicide bombers
blew themselves up at a naval college in Lahore,
killing at least five people and wounding 19. On January 10, a militant approached
a group of police officers guarding a courthouse and detonated himself, killing
24.
Tuesday’s bombings come after the
moderate parties announced that they would form a coalition government, to
achieve political stability in Pakistan.
