"VARIOS PAQUISTANIES LLEVAN A LAS VICTIMAS DE UNA EXPLOSIÓN SUICIDA A UN HOSPITAL DESPUÉS DEL ATENTADO EN PESHAWAR, EL LUNES TARDE".
"Bomber Strikes, Near
Political Rally in Pakistan".
"Pakistani men carried blast victims to a hospital after a suicide bombing in Peshawar on Monday".
"AGENCIAS. F. PRESS. 20.04.2010."A bomb disposal official said the young bomber was wearing a vest with as many as 15 pounds of explosives. Television cameras showed a frenzied scene of Islamic-capped youths from the protest helping people, onto stretchers and clapping their heads in grief".
"Though no one claimed responsibility for the attack, and it was not officially confirmed, it appeared that the target was one of the city’s senior police officers, Gulfat Hussein, said his colleague, Karim Khan".
"Mr. Hussain, the deputy superintendent of Peshawar police, may have been targeted because he is a Shiite who often helped arrange security for Shiite religious festivals and was known in the city, Mr. Khan said. If so, the attack would be the third against Shiites in four days".
"The blast, which took place in the Qisa Kawani market area, also killed more than 20 others, including Dost Muhammad, a local leader for the political party, Jamaat-e-Islami, which had gathered to protest electricity cuts. The rally would be a highly unusual target, given the party’s history".
"Jamaat Islami, Pakistans oldest Islamic political party, is a hard-line group that, until recently, had publicly supported the Taliban. Its hard-line language sometimes echoes that of the Taliban: anti-West, anti-India and strongly against Pakistan’s tiny religious minorities Christians, Shiites and an Islamic sect called Ahmedis".
"But the party is also part of Pakistan’s, state establishment and has been critical of any direct attack on Pakistan’s army or its people".
"Sectarian violence, though, has long tormented Pakistan, where Shiites are a sizable minority, and attacks on them have been escalated in recent days".
"On Friday, militants shot a Shiite banker in Quetta, the capital of Baluchistan Province, and then, in a double attack that has become their signature, detonated a bomb in the hospital where he was taken, killing nine others, including a cameraman". w
"The banned militant Sunni group Lashkar e Jhangvi, claimed responsibility, the Pakistani media said, though it was impossible to verify the claim".
"Then on Saturday, a double bombing in a village where Shiite refugees had taken shelter in the district of Kohat in western Pakistan killed at least 38".
"Mr. Hussain, the police officer who was killed, had been active in protecting the Shiite procession of Muharram, which often draws militant attacks, Officer Khan said".
"Sectarian militancy is so prevalent that Shiite police officers sometimes ask not to be posted in the field, out of fear that they will be targets because of their sect. Al Qaeda, which has become strong here in recent years, is virulently anti-Shiite".
"It was the second bomb on Monday. The first exploded just seven hours before near a school, killing one student and wounding 10, the authorities said. The school, Police Public School Peshawar, a caters to the children of police officials".
"The attacks have shattered the relative quiet of the past three months. Violence dropped off late last year, during the Pakistani military’s offensive in South Waziristan, an area in western Pakistan where the Taliban was strong".
"A senior intelligence official said that the recent attacks seemed to emanate from the Orakzai tribal region, an area where Pakistan’s security forces have been fighting militants for weeks".
"They are all coming from there", the official said of the bombers. "They have taken shelters in the urban areas and are now targeting urban centers".
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