PAKISTAN: At least 40 people were killed and more than 100 wounded in Pakistan yesterday when a car bomb exploded at a rally to commemorate an assassinated militant religious leader.
Hours after the attack in the city of Multan, the interior minister said he would advise provincial governments to ban religious gatherings, except for those at mosques, adding that no banned militant groups would be allowed to continue their activities.
The bomb exploded in a crowd of mourners at a rally to mark the first anniversary of the shooting of Sunni Muslim militant Azam Tariq, head of the outlawed Sipah-e-Sahaba (Soldiers of Mohammad's Companions).
The attack came just days after a suicide bomber killed 30 people in the city of Sialkot. Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed said it could have been a sectarian act of revenge.
But in an apparent bid to head off a spiral of revenge attacks, Interior Minister Aftab Ahmed Khan Sherpao called it an act of terrorism with "no relevance to the sectarian divide". He said, "I do not see the involvement of any religious group," adding that he had advised provincial governments to be on alert for attacks during Friday prayers. ...
People were dispersing from the Multan rally in pre-dawn darkness when the bomb exploded, said Mr Sikander Hayat, the police chief of the city.
Abdul Jalil Naqvi, a leader of the main Shia militant group, the banned Islami Tehrik Pakistan, denied charges by Mr Tariq's group that it was a Shia attack. He called it a terrorist act aimed at inciting sectarian war. "We condemn it," he said.
In the wake of the attack, large patches of blood stained the ground and pieces of flesh lay scattered around. Nearby houses and shops were damaged.
President Pervez Musharraf said the incident "clearly shows that terrorists have no religion and are enemies of mankind."
Troops were deployed in Multan after about 3,000 Sunni protesters gathered outside the main Nishtar hospital to collect bodies for burial and chanted slogans against Shias and Musharraf. "Infidels, infidels, Shia infidels!" they shouted.
Most of the casualties were followers of Sipah-e-Sahaba, the outlawed group that has been blamed for many bloody attacks on Shias, who make up about 15 per cent of Pakistan's mainly Sunni population of 150 million.