Suicide blast rocks Lahore

Interior Minister Rehman Malik said the attack ? one of the deadliest in Pakistan this year ? could be retaliation for the government?s military offensive to rout Taleban militants from the northwestern Swat Valley. ?They (Taleban militants) have done this to make their presence felt,? he said. Recent assaults in Lahore, Pakistan?s second-largest city situated near the Indian border, have heightened fears that militancy in nuclear-armed Pakistan is spreading well beyond the northwest region bordering Afghanistan. No one immediately claimed responsibility for the bombing. Police said two suspects were detained. Raja Riaz, a senior minister in the Punjab provincial government, told reporters about 30 people were killed. Other reports claimed that figure could be higher. At least nine police and several intelligence agents were among the dead, officials said. The remainder of the dead and the bulk of the wounded were civilians caught in the midmorning blast in a busy downtown section of the city. Riaz accused Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), India?s intelligence agency, for carrying out the latest act of terrorism. Sajjad Bhutta, another senior government official, told reporters more than 250 people were wounded. ?The moment the blast happened, everything went dark in front of my eyes,? witness Muhammad Ali said. ?The way the blast happened, then gunfire, it looked as if there was a battle going on.? At midmorning with the streets crowded with cars and people, a white van pulled up in a narrow street separating the police and Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency buildings, police officer Sohail Sakheera said. Two gunmen stepped out, took cover behind concrete barriers protecting the buildings and opened fire. A driver remained in the van; Kazinform cites the Arab News. See www.arabnews.com for full version