Two car bomb blasts killed at least 16 people and wounded 150 in northwestern Pakistan today, evidence militants still have power to strike despite the death of a top Taliban commander last month.
A Taliban suicide bomber crashed his explosives-laden truck into a police station in the town of Bannu, North West Frontier Province, destroying the building and nearby houses, police said.
Shortly afterwards, a bomb planted in a car went off in the carpark of a commercial building close to a military hospital in the provincial capital of Peshawar.
"The frontside of the building has collapsed. Over two dozen cars have been destroyed," a Reuters witness said.
Qari Hussain, a Taliban commander who trains suicide bombers, called Reuters by telephone to take responsibility for the Bannu attack.
"The government was taking undue advantage of our silence. We will carry out more such attacks and these will be much more powerful," Hussain said, introducing himself as top spokesman of Pakistani Taliban chief, Hakimullah Mehsud.
Mr Hakimullah was appointed chief of Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, a loose alliance of around 13 militant groups, after the death of his predecessor, Baitullah Mehsud, in a missile strike by a pilotless US drone in South Waziristan on the Afghan border in August.
Militant attacks have tapered off after Mehsud's death but security officials say militants loyal to al Qaeda still pose a serious threat.
Thirty-three people were killed in a car-bomb suicide attack near the garrison town of Kohat this month.
Bannu is gateway to North Waziristan, a volatile tribal region on the Afghan border and a major sanctuary for al Qaeda and Taliban militants fighting both in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
Twelve Afghan militants were killed in a missile strike by a US drone aircraft near the house of an Afghan Taliban commander allied to al-Qaeda in North Waziristan late on Thursday night.
Pakistani forces have also made significant gains against the militants after they launched an offensive in northwestern Swat valley in late April, which helped allay international fears about the stability of the nuclear-armed US ally after militants made advances towards the capital, Islamabad.
Reuters