Eight Pakistanis were killed and 20 were wounded in a bombing at a cafe in Islamabad. Today’s attack is the latest in the Taliban’s new terror campaign outside the tribal areas.
The bombing occurred at a restaurant frequented by laborers and travelers on the outskirts of Pakistan’s capital, Daily Times reported. The bomb contained about eight pounds of explosives and left a one-foot deep crater. Witnesses indicated a child may have placed the bomb. Initial reports suggested a propane cylinder caused the explosion, but the cafe owner denied he used propane for fuel.
The Taliban have targeted cafes in Islamabad in the past. Last March, one civilian was killed and 15 wounded in a bombing at an Italian restaurant known to be frequented by foreigners. Twelve foreigners were wounded in the bombing.
The Taliban have reinitiated their attacks in Pakistan’s major cities after the government refused to halt security operation in the Swat district and the Bajaur tribal agency. In response, the government recently outlawed the Pakistani Taliban and threatened to seize assets and detain senior leaders.
The Islamabad attack is the fifth major strike since Aug. 20, and the seven since Aug. 12.
The bombing in Islamabad occurred the same day the Taliban targeted the senior US diplomat in Peshawar. The US Consulate’s principal officer and her driver evaded an ambush on the streets of Peshawar as she was driving to her office. Gunmen blocked the road an opened fire on her vehicle.
A suicide bomber killed 16 Pakistanis, including policemen, and wounded 20 in an attack on a police station in Swat on Aug. 23. A pair of bombers detonated outside the main gates of the Pakistani Ordnance Facility in Wah in Punjab province on Aug. 21. The day prior, a suicide bomber detonated in a hospital in Dera Ismail Khan. Thirty Pakistani civilians were killed and 25 were wounded.
Nine Pakistanis, including five policemen, were killed and more than 35 were wounded after a suicide bomber struck during Pakistan’s Independence Day celebration in the city of Lahore in Punjab province on Aug. 13.
The day prior, the Taliban took credit for a deadly bus bombing on a Pakistani Air Force bus in Peshawar. Thirteen Pakistanis, including 10 security officials, were killed and more than a dozen were wounded in the provincial capital of Pakistan’s Northwest Frontier Province.
The Taliban, al Qaeda, and allied terrorist groups maintain secure bases in Pakistan’s tribal areas and in some of the settled districts of the Northwest Frontier Province. These groups have established 157 training camps and more than 400 support locations in the tribal areas and the Northwest Frontier Province, US intelligence officials have told The Long War Journal.
On July 23, Prime Minister Syed Yusaf Raza Gilani and his cabinet were told that more than 8,000 foreign fighters were operating in the tribal areas.
5 Comments
Perhaps the time has come for the American military to take over the land transportation of military supplies bound for Afganistan, complete with adequately armed and trained security forces in the supply convoys, and with the appropriate Rules of Engagement. It would seem that it is either that, or a shift to virtually all air lift resupply along the lines of the Berlin air lift. We certainly, it seems to me, can not allow weapons and ammunition to be looted to fill the coffers of the Taliban and AlQ, to then be used in cross border raids to kill our own troops. I am sure that the current Pakistani government would not like armed American military convoys transiting their country, but it might be worth it to force them to choose which side they are on, and what price they are ultimately willing to pay to obtain peace at all costs.
The Thunder Run has linked to this post in the blog post From the Front: 08/27/2008 News and Personal dispatches from the front and the home front.
Who are the parties that are pulling the strings in Pstan? Some amt. of analysis leds me to this:
1) Army & ISI – Islamist
2) Army & ISI – Non Islamist
3) Taliban
4) Various Islamic fundemtalist groups other than Taliban
5) Jamaat, MMA and other religious parties
6) PPP, MMQ
Apart from 6, all of the others have a high stake in the Islamic terrorist succeding. I wont be surprised if rest of them have connections with Mahsud/Haqqani/Mulla FM/ in one way or the other …This leaves us with the question : Do we really see talks/persuations with Pstani politicians / diplomats succeding? Wont an all out invasion (on the lines of Iraq) be a more apt solution for the problem? Lets call spade a spade and take them on rather than beating around the bush … Or is the Western world waiting for a repeat of 9/11 / 7/7 before any action is taken?
Yes it would appear we’re mostly waiting for it to happen again.
No were not waiting for another 9/11, but the world is on the brink of destruction and now russia are flexing their muscles, did we not learn anything from the 2 world wars!