Police say explosion rocks investigative agency’s building in eastern Pakistan’s Lahore
By APSunday, March 7, 2010
Police: Blast hits gov’t building east Pakistan
LAHORE, Pakistan — A large explosion heavily damaged a building housing a government investigative agency in Pakistan’s eastern city of Lahore on Monday, police said. Casualties were feared, and rescuers scrambled to search for people trapped in the rubble.
The explosion appeared to be the biggest to strike the nuclear-armed, U.S.-allied country in several weeks.
No group immediately claimed responsibility, but suspicion immediately fell on the Pakistani Taliban and allied militant groups responsible for a wave of attacks that killed more than 600 people late last year — a stretch of violence that appeared to be retaliation for a military offensive against insurgents along the Afghan border.
The explosion in Lahore went off outside the Federal Investigation Agency building near the perimeter wall, police official Zulfikar Hameed said. TV footage showed a huge crater in the ground where the blast seemed to have originated, indicating it was a car bomb.
Parts of the brick building appeared to have collapsed, and there were piles of bricks and metal everywhere at the site, the footage showed. Ambulances rushed to the area.
The FIA is a civilian law enforcement agency that has been targeted by militant attacks before, though it appeared to be the first time this particular building had been hit.
