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Deadly Blast Rocks Lahore
MARCH 8, 2010, 3:03 A.M. ET
By REHMAT MEHSUD And TOM WRIGHT
ISLAMABAD—A suspected Islamist suicide bomber drove a car packed with explosives into a federal police office building during rush hour in the eastern Pakistani city of Lahore, killing at least 11 people, an attack which marked a renewal of assaults on major urban government installations that had abated in recent months.
Local television showed emergency workers removing bloodied body bags from a crater outside the shattered front of the Federal Investigation Agency offices, the main Pakistan police investigation body which has taken a lead on probing Islamic militant groups.
"It was a suicide attack. A suicide car bomber rammed his explosive-laden car" into the investigation agency building, said Tariq Saleem Dogar, the police chief of Punjab province of which Lahore is the capital. About 60 people were inured and the death toll could rise, officials said....
It was the first major attack against Pakistan state installations since late last year when a series of attacks hit police, army and government buildings in Peshawar, the provincial capital of the Northwest Frontier province.
The Pakistan Taliban has carried out attacks before on the Lahore headquarters of the FIA, which is similar in function to the U.S. Federal Investigation Bureau and is involved in counterterrorism operations. The latest attack was in October last year when militants stormed the FIA building and other police targets, killing 38 people.
The target of the latest attack is significant because the Federal Investigation Agency has been one of the most effective government bodies in cracking down on the Pakistan Taliban and other Islamist groups and has worked closely with U.S. intelligence, said Samina Ahmed, an Islamabad-based expert on the region with the International Crisis Group, a Brussels-based conflict resolution research body. "This is the one agency which is capable of infiltrating and gathering info on terrorist groups," she said.
Ms. Ahmed pointed out that despite the lull in major attacks on urban centers since the start of 2010, the Pakistan Taliban have been striking government targets in rural areas on a weekly basis this year....