Bombing destroys Pakistan's spy agency office (Correction)

Nov 14, 2009, 2:29 GMT

Pakistani Army soldiers secure the scene of a suicide car bomb attack, targeting the regional headquarters of the country\'s premier intelligence agency Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) in Peshawar, the capital of militancy-hit North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) Pakistan on 13 November 2009. EPA/ARSHAD ARBAB

Islamabad - Two suicide car bombings targeted the offices of an intelligence agency and a police station in north-western Pakistan on Friday, killing 17 people and injuring more than 80, officials said.

The suicide strikes came as the Pakistan Army reported that 12 soldiers and six Taliban militants had died in the ongoing military offensive in the South Waziristan district that is located in the same region.

A suicide bomber detonated his explosive packed in a car near the regional headquarters of the military's Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) in Peshawar, the capital of North-West Frontier Province on Friday morning, killing 10 people and injuring more than 60.

The blast, caused by around 200 kilograms of explosives, according to bomb disposal experts, destroyed much of the three-storey building located in the city's tightly guarded Khyber Road area.

Officials at the army's Inter-Services Public Relations department said seven security personnel were among the 10 killed while the wounded included both civilians and ISI personnel.

The blast damaged dozens of vehicles and smashed the windowpanes of buildings in the area.

'Military guards fired at the vehicle at a checkpoint but the bomber kept driving and detonated the explosives near the building,' a police officer said.

An hour later, a suicide car bomb exploded near a police station in Bannu, around 130 kilometres south of Peshawar, severely damaging the building.

'Five policemen and two civilians died while more than 25 are injured,' said the district police chief, Iqbal Marwat. Three suspects in police custody were also injured.

Marwat said the bomber detonated his explosives when the police guards challenged him around 40 metres from the building.

Taliban militants have killed more than 300 people in suicide strikes and brazen raids at crowded markets and security offices since mid-October when Pakistani troops launched a major offensive in their heartland of South Waziristan region near Afghan border.

The remote and mountainous district of South Waziristan is regarded a hub of global terrorism, with al-Qaeda members using the rugged mountainous territory to plan and carry out attacks on the Western forces operating in Afghanistan.

An army statement said on Friday that 10 soldiers who were wounded during clashes with the insurgents in Langar Khel area of South Waziristan a day ago succumbed to their injuries.

The troops successfully secured an important hilltop in Ahmed Wam area of the district after a fighting that left two troops dead and two injured, while 'six terrorists were killed,' the military statement said further.

Pakistani officials have said the intensified attacks on security installations and civilian targets would not shake their resolve to continue the assault in South Waziristan, where the militants 'are on the run.'

Taliban claim they were strategically retreating to the mountains and side valleys for a 'long guerrilla war.'

'We are in an open war with Taliban. Sometimes they would win and sometimes we would succeed,' Hussain told reporters. 'But we will continue our struggle till the complete annihilation of the terrorists.'

According to the army-reported casualties, at least 528 militants have been killed in the operation, while 63 soldiers have also died. The figures could not be verified independently.

Separately, the suspected militants attacked a convoy carrying supplies for the western forces in Afghanistan in Pakistan's south-western province of Balochistan, killing a driver and setting on fire five oil tankers.

Junid Arshad, a senior police official in the district, said more than a dozen attackers targeted the vehicles with assault rifles and rocket propelled grenades at a roadside restaurant where the tankers were parked.

'One driver tried to drive away his tanker but the attackers opened fire at the vehicle,' Arshad added. 'The driver was killed while two people were injured.'