Al-Qaeda, Taliban link suspected

Rawalpindi, September 4:

Two suicide bombings ripped through a military bus and a market near the Pakistani army headquarters today, killing 25 people in the latest attacks aimed at destabilising President Pervez Musharraf.

The bombers struck minutes apart in sensitive areas of the garrison city of Rawalpindi, near Islamabad, a coordinated strike that officials said bore the hallmarks of Osama bin Laden’s Al-Qaeda network and the Taliban.

The military and the government have suffered a string of attacks since the raid of the pro-Taliban Red Mosque in Islamabad in July, deepening the pressure on key US ally Musharraf amid a mounting political crisis.

“Initial investigations show the two blasts were carried out by suicide bombers,” interior ministry spokesman Brigadier Javed Cheema told AFP. Army spokesman Major General Waheed Arshad said 25 people were killed and 68 wounded.

The first bombing ripped apart a bus that was taking defence ministry employees to work during the morning rush-hour, leaving 17 of them dead, officials said.

“It looks like a man boarded the bus at the last minute and he was not a defence employee,” who then appeared to have blown himself up, Interior Secretary Kamal Shah said.

The second blast about 3 km away in the city’s crowded Royal Artillery bazaar was timed to target army officers who use the route to reach the military headquarters, security officials said.

At least eight people were killed in that blast, but it was not clear if any military personnel were among them, Shah said. Other officials said the attacker may have been on a motorcycle.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for either blast.

The sophistication of today’s blasts “shows an Al-Qaeda signature,” a top intelligence official told AFP on condition of anonymity, adding that the “perpetrators had good intelligence about their targets.” He said there was evidence of other Al-Qaeda plots in Pakistan, including two massive car bombs that were captured in northwestern Pakistan last month that were more high-tech than those normally used by their Taliban allies.