Pakistani blasts rattle Lahore's red light district

May 21, 2010, 18:40 GMT

Islamabad - A militant organization on Friday claimed responsibility for a series of low-level blasts that rocked a red light area in Pakistan's eastern city of Lahore and injured three people.

Five back-to-back blasts occurred in Shahi Mohalla, a neighbourhood where female singers perform dances for money and where customers can also pay for sexual favours. The explosions caused panic in the busy streets.

'These were low-intensity explosions and no one was killed. Two people are injured. Among them is one policeman and a child,' said senior police officer Shafiq Gujjar. 'These militants are trying to impose their way of life on us.'

A spokesman of the militant organization Difa-e-Nazria-e-Pakistan (Defence of the Ideology of Pakistan) told reporters via text message a few minutes before the blasts that these were just warnings for those spreading obscenity in the country.

The groups has previously accepted responsibility for similar warning blasts near theaters and sites of cultural events.

Lahore, a cultural capital of militancy-plagued Pakistan, has seen several bombings since 2007, when Pakistan started serious military actions against Taliban and al-Qaeda in its tribal region near the Afghan border.

On March 12 this year, two suicide bombers blew themselves up within seconds of each other near a convoy of military vehicles in the eastern city of Lahore, killing 48 people and injuring 95.